Five patients with covid-19 died of suffocation this week in a southern Nepal hospital due to lack of oxygen, as there is a rapid rise in cases in the country coronavirus, while its health system is in a worse state than that of India.
The number of new daily cases has increased 60 times since April 1 and now reaches about 9,000. Nearly 1,000 people have died in the last ten days.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, Nepal has recorded 422,349 cases of covid-19 and 4,252 deaths, but as in India, the real numbers are likely to be even higher.
Almost half of those who undergo coronavirus testing are positive and have serious cases they do not stop flocking to hospitals, with oxygen cylinders running out faster than they can fill.
In Kathmandu, hospital authorities said they could not accept other patients, with families of covid-19 sufferers desperately looking for a bed.
Five patients in an intensive care unit at a hospital in Rupedechi died of suffocation this week.
“Our vehicles lined up to refill the bottles at three different refueling stations, but none were able to return on time,” said Bisnu Gautam, a doctor at Lubini Regional Hospital.
Lack of oxygen
Gaurav Sarda, president of the Nepal Oxygen Industry Association, explained that demand exceeds production capacity.
“All Kathmandu oxygen plants operate 24 hours a day and produce oxygen to the maximum of their capacity. “We can fill 8,000 bottles a day, but the demand is much higher,” he explained.
Samir Kumar Anthikari, head of the health ministry’s emergency center, said the country was “in crisis”.
“If 20% of people who remain isolated in their homes need a hospital bed, we will not be able to deal with it,” he said.
The reasons for the rapid spread of the epidemic in Nepal are corresponding to the reasons that led India to a state of health crisis.
Although there has been a sharp rise in cases in Nepal since early April – two months after India – the government has continued to allow religious celebrations and political rallies.
Many Nepalese went to the Indian festival of Kub Mela, which was attended by millions of devout Hindus, and many Indians passed through Nepal until international flights from India were suspended.
Call for international assistance
The Nepalese Medical Association has called on politicians to “postpone their political calculations” and prioritize saving lives.
Nepal is heavily dependent on India for vaccine imports, but she had to freeze exports in March to meet her own needs and did not deliver to Nepal despite half of the vaccines she had ordered.
In the country of 30 million people, only 2.4 million vaccines have been given from India and China and less than 1% of the population has received two doses.
Nepal is now turning to China. This week a plane was sent to China to pick up a first shipment of 400 oxygen cylinders, while Beijing has delivered 800,000 doses of vaccine to Nepal.
Two Nepalese have been mobilizing since Wednesday to raise emergency aid for the country., creating the hashtag #vaccines4nepal on Twitter (Vaccines for Nepal).
Nepal’s UN coordinator Sarah Beisolou Niadi said the country was in dire need of help.
“We see a similar burden to India, but less capacity to deal with it,” he said, calling on the international community to “realize how vulnerable Nepal is.”
On Monday, the government called for help, prioritizing oxygen, equipment for intensive care units and vaccines.
“If the help we ask for does not come, we will be heading for a horrible situation, which will be very difficult to manage,” Anthikari warned.
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