Snapchat Introduces New Donation Lenses to Help WHO Fight Coronavirus Pandemic

The COVID-19 outbreak had made countries go into lockdown to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus. With everyone working from home, and generally spending all their time inside, social platforms are working overtime to keep the lights up. People are relying on popular social platforms to not only stay up, but also offer the right kind of support. Last month, Snapchat rolled out a new search tool to help users manage their coronavirus-induced anxiety. Earlier this month, Snapchat also launched new Snap lenses to promote social distancing. Snap is now adding new AR-based donation lenses to help WHO fight the COVID-19 outbreak globally.

Snapchat users in India can now scan a Rs. 500 currency note to fire up the new donation lenses in the app. The AR-based experience will inform the user about how a donation could help the World Health Organization (WHO) fight the COVID-19 outbreak around the world. The new donation lenses are also available in Pound, Euro, and Dollar currencies.

The new lenses are built in collaboration with the United Nations Foundation's COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund to support WHO. The AR experience will redirect users to WHO donations page. WHO page only supports donations in USD right now, so you will have to use your credit card to donate. No other mode of payments is supported right now.

Besides scanning Rs. 500 currency notes in India, Snapchat users can also access these new donation lenses in the lens carousel, by scanning a Snapcode, or by using Scan.

In a prepared statement, the company said, "Snap has believed that Snapchatters play a critical role in stopping the spread of the virus; and has seen increased engagement across the platform, including in Snaps sent between best friends, voice and video calling."

Last month, Snapchat rolled out its 'Here For You' search tool that aims to help users with their coronavirus anxiety and other mental health issues. The tool was supposed to launch later this summer but due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, the launch occurred at an earlier date. Snap also added two new augmented reality lenses to Snapchat last month to promote social distancing to help slow down the spread of the novel coronavirus across countries.

How are we staying sane during this Coronavirus lockdown? We discussed this on Orbital, our weekly technology podcast, which you can subscribe to via Apple Podcasts or RSS, download the episode, or just hit the play button below.