While most of the world self-isolates at home and skies are emptier than they have been for decades, humanitarian flights transporting life-saving aid are revving up around Asia-Pacific.
On 3 June, a special chartered Malaysia Airlines 737 departed Kuala Lumpur for Kathmandu with aid workers and 3.8 metric tonnes of medical supplies donated by UNICEF and World Food Programme (WFP).
With the suspension of commercial international flights since March, Nepal has made an exception to allow this and subsequent humanitarian flights to land in Kathmandu in support of its COVID-19 response.
Reaching people in war zones or natural disasters is never easy. With most flights grounded, borders closed and workers in quarantine, delivering supplies to families and communities in need in the COVID-19 era has become the greatest challenge the WFP has faced in its nearly 60-year history.
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The humanitarian community in Afghanistan can now rotate their personnel in and out of the country with flights connecting Kabul and Doha. Similar operations are planned for the Pacific Island countries, which are even more reliant on air transport for basic goods and services.
Working together with the region’s governments, we plan to connect more humanitarian operations in Asia and the Pacific to our logistics hubs in China and Malaysia. From there, vital supplies are also being dispatched to the COVID-19 frontlines in other parts of the world.
“We are only as strong as the weakest,” the United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres once said. He has asked all governments to grant permission for humanitarian flights to land until regular commercial flight services are restored.
With each flight, WFP and our partners take all necessary precautions to avoid transmitting the virus. But without access, it will be a struggle to ensure that people everywhere have the medical supplies and equipment they need to face this pandemic.
To keep humanitarian workers safe and healthy – without burdening over-stretched medical services – we are also asking some governments whose health care systems have the capacity to allow aid personnel access to life-saving medical assistance if required.
In just a few months, COVID-19 has sent shockwaves throughout the world. Governments are struggling to flatten the curve of the pandemic, racing against time to save the lives and livelihoods of their citizens.
At a time like this, it’s natural to focus on issues closer to home. But as long as COVID-19 is ravaging any country, it is a threat to us all. We stand a far better chance to defeat the virus and restore livelihoods sooner rather than later by entrusting and leveraging each other’s strengths.
Protecting the humanitarian supply chain and humanitarian workers is a prerequisite to a successful COVID-19 response, especially if we are to prevent the health crisis from becoming a humanitarian catastrophe.
John Aylieff is World Food Programme (WFP) Regional Director for Asia and the Pacific.
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