The UK must help Nepal
Kathmandu Post
Nepal, May 27 -- By the end of the first wave of Covid-19, Nepal had lost around a thousand lives. This mortality rate was much lower than that of many other countries worldwide. Some attributed it to chance theory, but many linked it to the immunity of the Nepali people. Even Prime Minister Oli proudly acclaimed the strong Covid resistance of the Nepali population at large. The truth, however, started unfolding to us since the beginning of April when the second wave made its way, raising the death toll to an alarming 6,000-plus.
The wake of the second wave was not devoid of scientific observations either. Addressing the Britain-Nepal Academic Council, Prof Sharad Onta of the People's Health Movement stressed border management as an important strategy to break the chain of community transmission. Prof Padam Simkhada of Huddersfield University made a timely address to the Society of Nepalese Engineers in the United Kingdom, illustrating Nepal's infection and death rates as being higher than that of an already in-focus India.