Nepal Army's helicopter dropped us in Khalanga, the district headquarters of Jajarkot, and then flew to Paink VDC, the worst-affected area. Out of the 12 deceased, 10 were from the VDC alone. The helicopter landed at the bank of a river and half of the medicines brought from Kathmandu were dropped there.
We hired six mules to transport the medicines to the health camp set at Paink VDC. About 250 ailing people were waiting in queue. Seriously ailing people, who were too feeble to stand, were lying on the ground. The people were very scared by the plague spreading in their VDC.
They appeared to be relieved after seeing a team of health workers and medicines in their hands.
Interestingly, all the influenza-affected people were thronging the health camp instead of seeking treatment at the district hospital.
The influenza-hit VDCs are so remote that it takes three days of walk to reach the hospital which is located at the district headquarters.
We could also sense financial worries among the patients as they knew they could not afford treatment at the district headquarters.
Out of all patients we saw at the health camp, a few needed to be treated in close supervision of doctors, but we were helpless. The sub-health post at the VDC, which the government recently upgraded to a health post, looked no better than a cowshed. Flies were seen all over the floor of the health post. There was no way we could admit them at the health post, so we sent them--even the seriously ailing patients--home.
We were still unaware of the disease at the time. I collected throat swab from 12 suspicious patients and sent them to the capital in the helicopter.
Since it takes three days just to reach to the capital by bus, sending the samples through helicopter was the only option as the samples must be delivered to a laboratory within 24 hours. Laboratory report confirmed presence of swine flu virus in three samples.
Meanwhile, we don't know the exact cause behind the deaths as samples were not taken from dead body. No one was interested to know the real cause of the deaths.
I also visited the nearby disease-affected VDCs and the conditions were not much different from what we had seen in Paink VDC. The health facilities were running out of essential drugs that the government says should be available free of costs. There were no health workers in the field. We cannot just blame the doctors for avoiding remote villages when there is no environment for them to stay there.
I had served in the district in 2009 when it was reeling under cholera epidemic that killed over two hundred people. We had hoped that people of Jajarkot would not have to succumb to a minor disease like swine flu, which is a common flu in the country.
I came to know that the disease was an outbreak a month ago. Locals told us that 30 students taking SLC examination had fainted in the exam hall. All of them showed symptoms of influenza virus.
Swine flu virus was later confirmed in some students. Locals told us that the disease spread from a man who had returned from India a month ago.
I think that we forgot the difficulties of Jajarkot people soon after the cholera came into control. Adverse geography, lack of awareness, malnutrition, poverty and adverse weather conditions all contributed to the spread of infection in the district.
As told to Arjun Poudel. Dabal BC is a lab technician who served at the influenza-hit VDCs of Jajarkot for one week.
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