KATHMANDU, March 26 (Xinhua) -- It is a challenge for Nepal to curb the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, the United Nations Resident Coordinator for Nepal, Valerie Julliand, has said while describing the South Asian nation's virus response so far as "satisfactory."
Nepal, in its third day of a week-long nationwide lockdown Thursday, has reported three confirmed cases.
Julliand said she welcomed the government decision made on Monday to order a lockdown hours after the report of the second case of novel coronavirus infection in the country, adding Nepal is actually learning from China and other countries and implementing similar measures.
"It is hard for the country as it puts geo-economy and life of the country on hold, but it's still a good decision to take," Julliand told Xinhua.
She said the pandemic cannot be fought by only one actor, but there should be individual responsibility from the general public and solidarity from every sector.
"It's definitely a challenge to fight the epidemic" for Nepal considering its development status, but the country's level of preparedness against COVID-19 is "satisfactory," she noted.
"We are closely working with the Ministry of Home Affairs and different entities of government. Instead of having separate plans for UN or for government, we have a joint planning which is more important to make the response more efficient and more coordinated," said the UN official.
According to her, Nepal has made preparations accordingly for response to the projected COVID-19 situation with a few cases, 1,500 cases or over 7,000 cases.
The UN official in Nepal also said more efforts are needed for the government to have a high level of communication with the whole population including those without access to any media.
On the long-term economic and social impacts of the coronavirus on the nation of about 29 million people, Valerie expressed the concern that some Nepali people might become impoverished after the end of outbreak.
"Health response is the central point during such a pandemic, but we also need to have a larger view of social and economic impacts," she said.
