[Expedition operators are preparing to airlift thousands of cylinders from the Himalayas as expeditions are completed this month, the culmination of the climbing season. Kul Bahadur Gurung, general secretary of the Nepal Mountaineering Association, estimated that tour companies would be able to provide at least 4,000 cylinders by the first week of June.]
By Bhadra
Sharma
The unusual appeal reflects the
strange duality in Nepal: While hundreds of foreign climbers are attempting
costly expeditions to the summits of Mount Everest and other peaks,
the impoverished nation down below is facing urgent shortages of hospital beds,
medical oxygen, coronavirus test kits and other supplies.
Expedition operators are preparing
to airlift thousands of cylinders from the Himalayas as expeditions are
completed this month, the culmination of the climbing season. Kul Bahadur
Gurung, general secretary of the Nepal Mountaineering Association, estimated
that tour companies would be able to provide at least 4,000 cylinders by the
first week of June.
“We are asking them not to leave
even a single oxygen cylinder in the mountains,” Mr. Gurung said.
Climbers attempting to reach the
top of Everest, the world’s tallest peak, and other mountains carry oxygen to
help them breathe in the thin air. Although Nepal prohibits leaving equipment
behind in the mountains, canisters are sometimes left
buried in the snow by exhausted climbers or stashed by expedition
companies for later use.
Cylinders used in mountaineering
are smaller to those typically found in intensive-care wards, but Mahabir Pun,
a prominent Nepali scientist who is helping to lead the cylinder drive, said
that they could be used by patients who cannot find a hospital bed or who are
being treated at home.
“I.C.U. beds are already filled
with critical Covid patients, so we want to distribute these portable
expedition cylinders with regulators for those patients staying in home
isolation,” Mr. Pun said.
Nepal’s outbreak has surged in
recent weeks, most likely fueled by the virus’s catastrophic
surge in India, with which it shares a long, porous border. On May 1, Nepal
reported 26 deaths from the virus. On Tuesday, the official death toll was 225.
Doctors say that a
shortage of medical oxygen is a factor in many of the deaths. Many
hospitals have stopped admitting new Covid-19 patients, citing a lack of
oxygen. Wealthy families are airlifting their loved ones by chartered
helicopter to cities where they can find intensive-care beds. Other patients
are being treated in makeshift emergency facilities set up in parking lots and
other open spaces.
With almost half of Nepal’s
coronavirus tests coming back positive, health experts warn that the worst is
yet to come.
China has pledged to provide Nepal
with 20,000 oxygen cylinders and 100 ventilators, the first batch of which
arrived on Tuesday.
Expedition companies are stepping
in with smaller donations. Mr. Gurung’s group said that he was sending five
dozen cylinders, along with a few more from a local mountaineering museum, to
hospitals treating coronavirus patients.
Mingma Sherpa, chairman of Seven
Summit Treks, Nepal’s largest expeditions operator, said that he planned to
ship as many as 500 cylinders used in expeditions to Everest and other peaks
soon after climbers descended to base camps.
“My only condition is that those
cylinders should be used for poor and helpless people rather than V.I.P.s,” he
said, adding: “It’s our responsibility to help the government during these
trying times. We will do it happily.”
