General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsCovid reached Everest base camp. Now climbers are trying to prevent its spread amid a record season.
As Indias massive coronavirus wave spreads, neighboring Nepal is also quickly becoming overwhelmed. An average of 6,700 cases are now reported a day as of May 5, an increase from 1,100 just two weeks earlier. Even as the country faces its steepest coronavirus wave yet, it has kept its main tourist attraction, the Nepali side of Mount Everest, open to foreigners seeking to climb the worlds tallest mountain.
After the 2020 climbing season was canceled, this year a record number of 408 expedition permits have been issued for the peak, leaving climbers to work out rules to contain the spread of the virus. Now growing concerns of a coronavirus outbreak at the mountain cast doubt on the safety of climbers and locals after multiple people were evacuated from base camp and later tested positive for the virus.
Nepals Department of Tourism requires a negative coronavirus test 72 hours before entering the country. But in late March the government removed a seven-day quarantine requirement, in an attempt to revive the countrys $2 billion tourism industry that contributes roughly 8 percent of the countrys gross domestic product. Everest expeditions alone contributed more than $300 million to the economy in 2019.
Once on the mountain, climbers have no way to access tests unless they bring their own. We dont have tests, said Prakash Karel, a doctor who treats patients at the Everest base camp, explaining that the clinic he works at doesnt have laboratory permission to test for the virus. And high altitude makes it difficult to identify covid from cough and HAPE [high-altitude pulmonary edema], which is common here.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/interactive/2021/mount-everest-basecamp-coronavirus-nepal/?itid=hp-top-table-main-0430b
bamagal62
(3,264 posts)Who would go to Mt. Everest during covid? I rarely go to the grocery store.
FarPoint
(12,412 posts)Brave souls without critical thinking skills.
former9thward
(32,030 posts)I have not changed my daily life at all during Covid. I go where I always have at the same frequency.
bamagal62
(3,264 posts)Skittles
(153,169 posts)no indeed
Treefrog
(4,170 posts)Smh.
Spider Jerusalem
(21,786 posts)bamagal62
(3,264 posts)But, Im not normally out to prove anything to anyone. So, I find it odd. I mean you probably had to get on a plane to get there. I would not get on a plane for anything right now. But, I guess I dont understand. I wish them luck.
Initech
(100,087 posts)former9thward
(32,030 posts)Generally the people who climb Everest are in pretty good shape. Those are people science say are the least likely to suffer major effects from Covid.