Singapore sends Covid-19 aid to Nepal

Singapore’s Temasek Foundation with Lotus Life Foundation Singapore and the Nepal government flew in a first consignment of 13 tons of Covid-19 relief to Kathmandu on Saturday, and the next flight is due in a few weeks.

The cargo was flown in by Nepal Airlines and included Ventilators, Bi-Pap systems and pulse oximeters PCR test kits and swabs, RNA extraction machines, kits and reagents, and were handed over to Health Minister Hridayesh Tripathi for distribution to various hospitals around the country. 

The test kits are manufactured by Mirxes and its partner company ASTAR, which were one of the few companies in Singapore manufacturing PCR test kits on a large scale when the pandemic broke last year. 

ASTAR is Singapore’s national science and tech, R&D organisation under the Ministry of Trade and Industry and works on healthcare, advanced manufacturing, urban sustainability and digital economy. The Fortitude kit is one of Astar’s development in collaboration with Singapore’s 2nd largest public hospital, Tan Tock Seng Hospital, and MiRXES. Also involved was the Lotus Life Foundation, a Singapore-based charity that works in Nepal.

Benedict Cheong, CEO of Temasek Foundation International in a statement said: 'The latest waves from multiple variants of Covid-19 have shown that we need to continue working together to save lives and bring the pandemic under control. Temasek Foundation stands in solidarity with our friends and neighbours in Nepal to fight the global war against the pandemic.'

The Singapore-based Temasek Foundation had previously provided Fortitude 2.0 PCR Covid-19 diagnostic test kits and oxygen concentrators to Nepal in 2020.