By Ajita Rijal

Kathmandu, Jan. 7: In order to stop the entry of unknown epidemic diseases from the vulnerable countries, the government has issued a travel advisory on public health for disembarking international tourists.
The Epidemiology and Disease Control Division (EDCD) of the Ministry of Health and Population (MoHP) has issued an updated travel advisory on public health requirements for disembarking international passengers arriving in Nepal by air at Tribhuvan International Airport (TIA).
The new advisory states that the disembarking passengers at TIA arriving from or transiting (for more than 12 hours) from countries with risk of yellow fever or polio transmission, are required to have vaccination certificates.
At the TIA, the health desk is set up to screen incoming passengers for unknown diseases but the services came to a halt, for some time due to staffing and budgeting issues, said Dr. Bibek Kumar Lal, director at the Epidemiology and Disease Control Division (EDCD).
All staff members working at the airport’s health desk was transferred elsewhere as part of the government’s staff adjustment process, added Dr Lal. The EDCD is authorised for running the health desk at the TIA.
“Now we are operating the health desk with two health workers deployed in a contract basis, one paramedics and a nurse. But this is very insufficient manpower to operate the health desk at TIA,” said Dr Lal, adding the concerned authorities and the Ministry of Health and Population should be concerned over the issues.
The health desk should be equipped with necessary infrastructure and manpower,

said Dr Lal, adding a team of full-fledged health workers, including vector surveillance is obligatory at a health desk in international airports and the border points.
As Nepal is a member state of the International Health Regulation and it has committed to responding and preventing public health risk, it is the responsibility of the government to set up health desks at international entry points, including international airports and overland crossings, said Dr. Bishnu Gautam a section chief of Epidemiology and Outbreak Management Section at EDCD.
The EDCD is in the process to operate the desk in other eight international land border crossings, that too had human resources crunch, said Dr. Gautam.
Though it’s challenging for getting the vaccine certificates from the visitors of those risks countries having polio and yellow fever, it’s an obligatory to stop the entry of epidemic diseases, said Gautam. “It may affect the campaign VNY 2020, and all the stakeholders should discuss on how to deal with the issue,” said Dr. Gautam.
With the kick start of the Visit Nepal Year (VNY) 2020 amidst fanfare on January 1 and all the promotional activities ongoing in high gear abroad, the concerned authorities must make foreigners aware about those transferable diseases.
Moreover, the experts warn of the spreading epidemic risk diseases in lack of proper health screening for deadly diseases at the country’s only international airport that welcomes more than 10,000 passengers every day.
According to World Health Organisation (WHO), high traffic can play a vital role in the spread of deadly diseases internationally.