Jaishree Subrahmanium is a botanist who did her PhD in ecological genomics from the French National Institute of Agricultural Research. She has been working with Lotus STEMM, a Canadian NGO working on representing South Asian women in STEM careers, where she established a mental health support community -‘Paksh’. We spoke with Jaishree about her experience with this initiative and lessons from the same.

A catastrophe at the scale of the COVID-19 pandemic affects us not only at the physical level but also leaves an indelible imprint on our mental well-being. We spoke to Biju Viswanath, faculty at the Department of Psychiatry, National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences (NIMHANS), Bengaluru, about possible mental-health-related consequences of the present situation and what individuals and families can do to cultivate resilience.