07 June, Kathmandu:
The Provisional health directorate of Gandaki Province confirmed a new case of coronavirus at Mustang yesterday, a district after the Himalayas. According to information the directorate published, the infected one is an old lady of age 83 and she has been taken to isolation for further treatment. According to the ministry, the coronavirus has now spread to 75 districts of Nepal, with just Okhaldhunga and Rasuwa untouched.
From the first case found in Nepal on 23 January to till date, the number of cases has spiked to 8 thousand 6 hundred and 21. So far, 22 people have died from the virus. The statistical report of Districts of Nepal shows that 11 districts are with more than two hundred confirmed cases where Rautahat, Dailekh, Kapilvastu, Sarlahi, Mahottari, Surkhet, Dang, Dhanusha, Rupandehi, Banke and Kailali are the respective districts. Beside this, 23 districts are carrying 50 to 200 confirmed cases . Similarly, rest are with 1 to 50 confirmed cases.
With the rise in the number of cases , fear is also hiking daily. In between frights, management by the government is disappointing. Health minister Bhanubhakta Dhakal stated that the cases may rise up to 39 thousands as they have predicted. To the contrary, he informed that the government has the capacity of only one thousand ventilators and ICUs. It’s a miserable face of our situation. According to Dhakal, only 5 percent of confirmed cases require critical care. It’s a very light statement from health minister and unexpected too. In 75 percent of total deaths, cases were confirmed only after death. It shows that the country is unable to institute a reliable testing regime.
According to Dr Basudev Pandey, head of the Department of Epidemiology and Disease Control, about 15 to 25 percent of confirmed cases are imported. It’s because the person confirmed with the virus is one who came to Nepal after the overflow of pandemic. Thousands of swabs are not tested and are stuck in the queue. Due to lack of management and preparations, the whole country is suffering. Quarantine centers of Nepal are dangerously crowded. In addition they lack basic facilities such as clean water, nutritious food and they offer poor medical services.
The scenarios around denote the critical situation of both the government and the country. In these three months after the first case, the government never seemed to be sensitive towards Corona management. Experts are predicting the upcoming phases to be more dangerous than present.
