Washington DC. The world was terrorized when the corona pandemic began its expansion course nine months ago. The fear people had then has converted to awareness now. Dr Binod Khadka, who is involved in the treatment of corona patients in two major hospitals in Wisconsin State of the US,  shares his experience  and tells that not only the patients, the health care professionals also dreaded the disease in the initial days.

“The first time I had to treat a corona positive patient, I prayed to God before going to the treatment room,” he told. “I was alarmed as I could contract the disease and feared about the disease being transferred to my family.”

The second wave of corona has engulfed the world now and thousands are being infected in the US daily. Sharing the statistics of COVID-19 in US, Dr Khadka, who has dealt with more than five hundred corona cases and leads a team of above 40 health professionals, says,” In the US where all health facilities are available, a COVID-19 patient is added every second and there is one casualty every two minutes.”

Talking with Kiran Dhakal for DCNepal’s fortnightly talk show “Health Concern” Dr Khadka suggested all to make compulsory use of the ‘SMS’ formula to prevent oneself from acquiring the virus: ‘S’ meaning safe distance, ‘M’ meaning mask and ‘S’ again meaning sanitizer. He argues that there is no other effective measure to avoid corona virus at present than the combined practice of maintaining safe distance, wearing mask and applying sanitizer.

46.4 million people worldwide have been infected by the virus after the register of first case in November 17, 2019 in Wuhan. China. People have to be cautious and follow the preventive measures, he said. With the advent of winter in US and Nepal both, situation can aggravate, he warns. One has to rest, take a lot of fluids and go to the hospital if the infection gets serious.

As the medicine for corona has not been developed yet, Dr Khadks’s team has been using a steroid called dexamethasone to boost immunity power. Besides this, remdesivir and plasma therapy are being used sometimes but one cannot claim a single medication as a cure for COVID-19, he said and added that people should consume foods that help develop resistance against diseases. He told,” Let’s not go out of our house unless really necessary; and if we must, let’s not forget to maintain physical distance and use mask.”

Dr Khadka, who is also the vice-president of America Nepal Medical Foundation, opines that availability of oxygen alone can save lives in Nepal. The foundation has provided a monetary help of a hundred thousand rupees each to Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital in Kathmandu and Koshi Hospital in Biratnagar to be used for the oxygen plants in the hospitals.