Kathmandu, Oct. 15 -- For two months now, the Covid-19 Crisis Management Centre has been generating the heat map of the country's coronavirus daily cases. Based on the data provided by the Epidemiology and Disease Control Division, the technical staff at the centre update the heat map, identifying red zones and emerging hotspots. The map is then shared with ministry officials and higher authorities for devising a plan of action.

The plan includes whether to seal those areas or increase the number of tests or expand contact tracing. Recommendations are made accordingly.

But the higher authorities barely pay heed to the recommendations, according to officials at the centre, which was formed a little over six months ago to fight the pandem...