Many people are showing symptoms of Covid-19 in Nepal’s Bajhang, a district in its northwestern Sudurpashchim province. However, when health officials visited them in villages, most people refused to get tested. 

Records show only 19 people have died of Covid-19 in the past few weeks but these are the actual death numbers. Almost 170 have died in the district. Of them, many were showing Covid-19 symptoms. 

Those still showing symptoms are refusing tests because of the stigma attached to the disease. “The local people are busy irrigating their fields. If they tested positive, they would have to go into isolation or to a hospital,” Jayaraj Awasthi, a local health worker of the district, was quoted as saying by the Kathmandu Post.  

“If they don’t work in their fields, there will be nothing to harvest. The pandemic has threatened their lives and livelihood. It’s difficult to convince them to undergo Covid-19 tests. They fear Covid-19 but also fear testing positive,” he added. 

This week, authorities organized a local medical camp to test those who were showing Covid-19 symptoms. Only 100 people turned up; many among them refused the test. 

Even people whose relatives tested positive, when approached, refused to undergo testing, fearing a positive result. 

“We have used only 2,350 antigen kits out of the total 7,000 kits that we received since the start of the second wave of Covid-19. The villagers refuse to be tested even when we reach their doorsteps,” said Narayan Joshi, the information officer at the District Health Office.

For people in the province, this is the only season when they get work locally. Mostly, people move to India for jobs. As the Covid-19 situation exploded in India a few weeks back, many people lost their temporary jobs there and returned to Nepal. They have been jobless for a long time now. 

(SAM)