In an unprecedented situation at one of Tibetan refugee settlements in India, Dekyiling Tibetan settlement has been locked down after recording 138 COVID-19 cases over the past week. With the raging spike in number of Coronavirus cases in India, many Tibetan refugee settlements are witnessing a worse situation in terms of infection compared to the first surge of the pandemic that was seen last year.
The Settlement Officer at Dekyiling Tibetan Settlement Office who is the welfare officer of Tibetans across Dehradun that has around nine different refugee camps has informed the Tibet Sun that apart from four elderlies on ventilators, there are no serious cases among this infected. He has stressed that others have shown mild symptoms like fever, coughing, headache and diarrhoea.
According to the report by Tibet Sun, the spike has been recorded following the conclusion of final round of exile Tibetan elections. Tibetan Settlement Officer Norbu explained that the sudden spike in the cases could be due to people returning from travels from other states, those who go to Debra Dun city for their day businesses, or houses in close proximity.
While the local Tibetan administration announced to locked down Dekyiling Settlement on April 16 with a plan to lift the restrictions by April 22, the situation has worsened ever since and the restrictions are being planned to be kept indefinitely. They will ensure that the number of cases come down to zero. According to the official website of Central Tibetan Administration, there are a total of 2011 cases of Coronavirus infections out of which 1660 have recovered. There are 303 active cases among Tibetans in India, Nepal and Bhutan while 48 deaths have been reported so far.
India is recording an average of more than 250,000 cases of Coronavirus infections daily taking the country by shock at a time when most of other countries are showing signs of improvement in containing the pandemic. India has proactively been contributing in producing vaccines for many countries but it has been struggling to sufficiently vaccinate its own population. Recent analysis show the country would not be able to vaccinate 70% of its population even by the year end at current pace.
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