The Tourism Ministry on Wednesday said it was establishing a one-stop platform to issue helicopter rescue permits in restricted areas after rising deaths due to delayed medical evacuation flights. The restricted areas adjoin the northern border with China. In these places, lengthy paperwork needs to be completed to fly ill persons to hospital.

A permit from the local administration is necessary to charter a flight. After the application is verified, the local administration recommends to the Home Ministry to provide a permit.

“We are aware that a lengthy procedure is involved for chartering rescue flights in restricted areas. Delayed rescue can put the patient’s life at risk,” said Tourism Minister Rabindra Adhikari at a press meet here on Wednesday.

“We are currently discussing whether a one-stop rescue mechanism can be established,” he said, adding that the government would reach a conclusion after one and a half months. People in remote areas have long been raising concerns over the long bureaucratic process that need to be completed to charter a flight. Upper Mustang, Upper Dolpo, Manaslu, Lower Dolpo, Rara Lake, Upper Gorkha, Rasuwa and Manang are some of the restricted areas in Nepal where foreign visitors need to obtain a special permit. Helicopters also need to get a permit to enter these regions.

Last Sunday, a 17-year-old girl, who sustained serious head injuries in a rock fall at Sirdibas in northern Gorkha, died as she could not be flown out for medical treatment in time. According to locals, it took nearly five hours to charter a helicopter to fly critically injured Salina Gurung to Kathmandu.

The victim was hit by a falling rock while she was returning home from an apple orchard at around 11am. The helicopter, which was chartered at a cost of Rs150,000, landed in the village only at 4pm. The victim bled to death en route to the Capital. Locals have no alternative but to charter a helicopter to take patients to hospital as the village is not connected by roads. Injured people requiring urgent care are flown to Kathmandu or some other city. The villagers complained that they have to wait for hours for helicopter rescue despite paying a lot of money.

“It took about five hours to bring a helicopter to take Salina to hospital. Such emergency incidents occur in remote areas frequently. The authorities should charter a helicopter immediately in case of an emergency,” Birbal Ghale, a local of Sirdibas, told the Post. Salina was pronounced dead at Nepal Medicity Hospital in Kathmandu. “The family members collected donations to charter a helicopter to take the body back home,” said Ghale.

‘99pc of fake rescues stopped’

The government claimed that 99 percent of ‘fake rescues’ have been eliminated after implementing the new medical rescue guidelines. “Definitely, we had a weak oversight mechanism that prompted insurance fraud by brokers in trekking and mountaineering agencies. But now, it’s under control,” said Tourism Minister Rabindra Adhikari. “We are strongly committed to enforcing the guidelines to make medical rescue safe and transparent.”

He added that the government had taken action against most of the companies involved in bogus medical rescue operations. “We dropped the idea of mobilising the Nepal Police for rescue operations since that would further complicate matters. Instead, the private sector will conduct rescues, but they will be properly monitored,” Adhikari said.

On September 1, the government launched the Tourist Search, Rescue, Medication and Monitoring Guidelines 2018 under which ‘intermediaries’ or middlemen have been banned from arranging emergency evacuation services for trekkers and mountaineers. The agency handling the tour package has been made legally responsible for looking after its customers from start to finish.

Helicopter companies, travel and tour operators, hospitals and insurance companies will now be required to submit details of rescue flights, medical treatment and insurance bills to the Tourist Search and Rescue Committee, Tourist Police and Department of Tourism. Recently revealed insurance scams involving bogus helicopter rescues and hospital treatment of tourists had rocked the tourism industry and embarrassed the government.