Villagers in Ladakh don't let anyone enter without washing hands amid Coronavirus outbreak

Despite being the smallest hamlet near the Line of Control (LoC) in Ladakh with 40 houses, has taken the lead in curbing the spread of deadly COVID 19 through a novel way. “Don’t enter this village without washing your hands,” greets visitors at the entrance of Latoo village of Ladakh.

The message, written both in English and Urdu, stresses on hand washing before entering the hamlet. Welcoming the initiative of the villagers, Deputy Commissioner, Kargil, Baseer-ul-Haq Choudhary, tweeted: “Role model# residents of Latoo village decided not allowing anyone without handwashing into their village.

More villages to come forward# Fight against Covid# More power to them. Pertinently, two persons who tested positive for coronavirus have recovered and were released from the hospital in the Union Territory of Ladakh, where no fresh case was reported for the last one week.

 

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Commissioner Secretary (Health) Rigzin Samphel, , said both the cured patients have been moved to a quarantine facility and will remain under surveillance. “Technically, now we have only 11 COVID-19 positive cases from the earlier 13 cases because two of them have tested negative and accordingly shifted from the isolation ward of the hospital to a quarantine facility. They will remain under surveillance,” said Samphel.

He further said the condition of the rest of the 11 patients is stable. The test reports of 18 samples - 15 from Kargil and three from Leh were received from Delhi and all of these were negative, he said. Leh District Magistrate Sachin Kumar Vaishya, meanwhile, warned of strict action legal against people found jumping quarantine period. “All persons who are placed under mandatory home quarantine shall strictly confine themselves within the premises identified/prescribed/advised by the medical department.

Any obstruction or refusal to comply with the direction shall be punishable under section 51 of Disaster Management act,” Vaishya said in his order. Pertinently, In its order, the Ladakh administration said in wale of the outbreak and as part of stringent precautionary measures against it spread, it is hereby ordered that no commercial flights landing at the KBR airport in Leh should carry passengers to Leh, other than the residents of Ladakh, civilian officers and officers of uniformed forces serving in Ladakh or on duty to Ladakh till further orders. 

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