UN Plans Zero-Covid Tonga Relief Effort

The United Nations said Friday it was adopting zero-Covid methods of delivering badly-needed food, fuel and clean water to Tonga as the volcano and tsunami disaster relief efforts finally get rolling

Geneva, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 21st Jan, 2022 ) :The United Nations said Friday it was adopting zero-Covid methods of delivering badly-needed food, fuel and clean water to Tonga as the volcano and tsunami disaster relief efforts finally get rolling.

UN agencies told reporters in Geneva that now Tonga's main runway had been cleared of ash following Saturday's eruption and the ports were opening, methods of bringing in aid that required no contact with locals were being taken up.

The remote Pacific island nation, home to around 100,000 people, recorded its only Covid-19 case in October and has imposed strict protocols to keep out the virus.

The UN's humanitarian agency OCHA said that incoming relief workers could face weeks in quarantine, so it was focusing on "no-contact delivery".