By Our Reporter
The third wave of COVID-19 is now spreading like wildfire across the country, with more than half of the daily cases in the Kathmandu Valley.
On Tuesday, the Ministry of Health and Population (MoHP) confirmed 10,258 new COVID-19 cases, the highest number of daily infections ever recorded in the nation. Prior to this, 9,317 infections were reported in a single day on May 11 last year.
Of the 10,258 cases reported on Tuesday, 5,549 cases were recorded in the Kathmandu Valley, with 4,004 cases in the Kathmandu district, 570 in Bhaktapur, and 975 in Lalitpur.
Of the new infections, 8,730 were reported through RT-PCR tests and 1,528 through antigen tests.
The daily COVID-19 infection rate, which was at 18 per cent a week earlier, jumped to 44. 93 per cent.
Along with the new cases reported on Tuesday, the nation’s COVID-19 tally of RT-PCR tests has reached 838,215 and that of antigen tests is at 103,983.
Of the total new cases, 65 per cent were recorded in Bagmati province at 6,717. Daily cases in the other six provinces are still less than 1,000 with the highest (985) cases in Province 1 and lowest (16) in Karnali.
If the present trend continues and the government does not apply stricter measures to control the crowd, the daily infection can reach over 20,000 in a week. However, many of those who have symptoms have not been tested. If all family members are ill in a family and if two of them test positive for the virus, others do not undergo tests. This means the real infections are double the confirmed cases.
Despite the increase in daily cases, the fatality has been stable. The daily deaths from COVID-19 were less than three for the past weeks. And vaccination is attributed to the low fatality rate. However, the government has not expedited the vaccination drive. Even many people do not visit vaccination centres to receive jabs. This is the reason, the government has decided to launch a five-day mass vaccination drive from January 31. The Home Ministry Tuesday decided to launch the drive making schools as vaccination centres.
Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba a few days ago also admitted that the vaccination has not been effective. He said there were vaccines but not people to receive them. Although 79 per cent of the targeted people in Nepal received the full dose as of Tuesday, the vaccination rate is less than 40 per cent in Madhes province. Many senior citizens who cannot walk to vaccination centres in villages have not received the doses. Even in Kathmandu, daily wage earners have not received even a single dose. As such, vaccinating all people by mid-April looks challenging.
Moreover, coronavirus cannot be controlled in Nepal without regulating borders with India. But the government has not done much to regulate them. When the daily cases have crossed 10,000, the government has not made a required number of holding centres in borders, not to talk about isolation centres.
While the strains of coronavirus have been spreading like a wildfire across the nation, the government recently started providing additional doses of COVID-19 to the frontline workers.
However, as the active caseload has jumped to 39,044, many frontline workers have been infected with the virus and are in isolation, putting them in a dilemma whether to take the additional dose or not while being COVID-19 positive.
Meanwhile, according to Dr. Sher Bahadur Pun, chief of the clinical research unit at Teku Hospital, it is not prescribed to take the additional dose while being COVID-19 positive.
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