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Features 22 FRIDAY, JULY 10, 2020
BISHKEK, KYRGYZSTAN (AFP) -
At a call centre functioning as a
coronavirushotlineinKyrgyzstan’s
capital Bishkek, the volunteers
manning the telephones are
under siege.
Call centre coordinator Askhat
Abdykerimov said he and his
team of more than 60 medics and
medical students are now Šielding
at least 3,000 calls per week.
“When the call centre Širst
opened, we had plenty of calls of a
non-medical nature,” Abdykerimov
told AFP .
“Now nearly all calls are people
ringing in with symptoms of
coronavirus infections.”
Bishkek has become a new
regional epicentre of the disease
that has re-emerged with a
vengeance since Kyrgyzstan
and fellow ex-Soviet neighbours
Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan began
relaxing stay-at-home restrictions
in May. Even Turkmenistan,
which still insists it is virus-free,
on Monday welcomed a 10-day
World Health Organization (WHO)
mission that will examine the
secretive country’s response to
the pandemic.
In Kyrgyzstan, registered daily
infections have twice topped 500
this month - more than the total
number of people recorded as ill
with coronavirus at the time the
lockdown was relaxed in late May.
The country has reported more
than 8,000 cases but many say the
real number of infections is higher,
pointing to overŠlowing hospitals
and social media timelines thick
with condolences and cries for
assistance. A lack of tests, as
well as their poor quality, are two
reasons coronavirus is increasingly
not being diagnosed or counted as
a cause of death, experts say.
Aigul Sarykbayeva, a 54-year-
old queuing for a drip treatment
at the capital’s main indoor sports
venue - recently repurposed as a
hospital - has not yet been able to
get tested for the virus. But after
battling to secure a lung scan,
Sarykbayeva was diagnosed with
pneumonia - a condition caused
by the virus that she said is ripping
through her neighbourhood.
“I sometimes think to myself,
is there anyone I know who isn’t
ill? Absolutely everyone is ill,” she
told AFP.
Kazakhstan, the richest of the
Šive Central Asian states, has also
seen its hospitals overwhelmed
and drug supplies squeezed as
registered cases have grown four-
fold since the beginning of last
month to top 48,000.
YevgenyYeremin,amanwhowas
in a long queue to buy medicines
in the former capital Almaty, said
he had considered coronavirus a
“joke” and “something political”
before his grandfather died from
the virus and his elderly mother
grew seriously ill.
Complaints poured onto social
media on Monday after ofŠicials
marked a public holiday honouring
the capital Nur-Sultan - named
in honour of ex-leader Nursultan
Nazarbayev - with an ostentatious
Širework display in the city.
Coronavirus ‘second wave’ batters
ex-Soviet Central Asia
A medical person assists an elderly man on the way to an ambulance in front of a medical facility for people
suffering from coronavirus disease and pneumonia in Bishkek. PHOTO: AFP
Dimash Kudaibergen, a singer
with a massive following in China as
well as his homeland, was among
those who criticised the move that
came as the ofŠicial virus death toll
reached 264 people.
“Fireworks in honour of what?”
the star wrote on his Instagram
page with 3.3 million followers. “In
honour of taking the Širst place for
coronavirus cases?”
While Kazakhstan has this
month reintroduced some of the
restrictions that it Širst imposed in
March, ofŠicials in Kyrgyzstan have
said they are not considering a
second lockdown.
The government has admitted
that pandemic-related aid received
from international donors was
used to pay state salaries and plug
budget holes compounded by
lockdown, rather than strengthen
the health system.
Across the corruption-prone re-
gion, the surge in cases has helped
fuel accusations that ofŠicials are
embezzling donor money.
One place where most agree
aid has been put to good use is
the Bishkek call centre, which was
brieŠly closed for disinfection in
June after two volunteers caught
the virus.
The importance of the
centre, which began with just 12
volunteers in April and advises
patients on further treatment, has
led some to argue it should take
on more staff.
But Shamil Ibragimov, Director
of the national branch of the Soros
Foundation that supported the
project at the beginning, said that
would only achieve so much.
“We can expand the centre
(again), but that will not add more
mobile brigades or hospital beds,”
Ibragimov said.
“Everywhere you look in the
system, there are bottlenecks.”
TOKOROZAWA, JAPAN (AFP) -
Olympic boxing hopeful Arisa
Tsubata is used to taking blows in
the ring but it is during her work as
a nurse that she faces her toughest
opponent - coronavirus.
The 27-year-old juggles a brutal
training regime in boxing gloves
with long, irregular hours in surgical
gloves at a hospital near Tokyo.
Tsubata mainly treats cancer
patients but she said the virus was
a constant threat, with medical
experts warning at the peak of
the pandemic that Japan’s health
system was close to collapse.
“We always face the risk of
infection at medical facilities,” she
told AFP.
“My colleagues and I have all
worked under the stress of possibly
getting infected.”
Like most elite athletes, the
virus played havoc with Tsuba-
ta’s training schedules, meaning
she welcomed the postpone-
ment of this year’s Tokyo Olym-
pics until 2021.
“It was a plus for me, giving me
more time for training, although
I wasn’t sure if I should be so
happy because the reason for the
postponement was the spread of
the infectious disease,” she said.
Tsubata took up boxing only two
years ago as a way to lose weight
but quickly rose through the ranks.
“In a few years after becoming a
nurse, I gained more than 10 kilos,”
she laughed.
“I planned to go to Hawaii with
my friends one summer, and I
thought I wouldn’t have much fun
in a body like that. That is how I
started boxing.”
She quickly discovered a knack
for the ring, winning the Japan
national championship and a place
on the national team.
But juggling her medical and
sporting career has not always
been easy and the Širst time she
fought a foreign boxer came only
in January, at an intensive training
camp in Kazakhstan.
“That made me realise how
inexperienced I am in my short
boxing career. I was scared,”
she admitted.
Japanese boxing authorities
decided she was not experienced
enough to send her to the Šinal
qualifying tournament in Paris,
which would have shattered her
Tokyo 2020 dreams - if coronavirus
had not given her an extra year.
Now she is determined to gain
the experience needed to qualify
for the rescheduled Games, which
will open on July 23, 2021.
“I want to train much more
and convince the federation that I
could Šight in the Šinal qualiŠiers,”
she said.
Her coach Masataka Kuroki told
AFP she is a subtle boxer and a
Fighting coronavirus, dreaming of Olympics: Meet Japan’s boxing nurse
Japanese boxer and nurse Arisa Tsubata takes a break during her training
at a hospital’s gymnasium in Saitama. PHOTO: AFP
quick learner, as he put her through
her paces at a training session.
She now needs to add more
defensive technique and better
core strength to her Šighting spirit
and attacking Šlair, said Kuroki.
“Defence! She needs more
technique for defence. She needs
to have a more agile, stronger
lower body to fend off punches
from below,” he said.
Her father Joji raised Arisa
and her three siblings single-
handedly after separating from
his Tahitian wife and encouraged
his daughter into nursing to learn
life-long skills.
He never expected his daughter
to be Šighting for a place in the
Olympics but proudly keeps all her
clippings from media coverage.
“She tried not to see us family
directly after the coronavirus broke
out,” the 58-year-old told AFP. “She
was worried.”
Tsubata now wants to compete
in the Games for all her colleagues
who have supported her and the
patients that have cheered her on
in her Olympic ambitions.
“I want to be the sort of
boxer who keeps coming back
no matter how many punches I
take,” she said.
“I want to show the people
who cheer for me that I can work
hard and compete in the Olympics,
because of them.”