⤳ deutsche Übersetzung

Ms. Ursula von der Leyen,

We are writing to you as students; the voice of the future. While we are young EU citizens, we are also global citizens, connected through our aspirations, hopes and dreams, with students in other parts of this world. It is precisely for that reason we are reaching out to you. 

Today, we are connected as fellow students through a pandemic of a scale not seen before, touching every corner of this globe. All of us, one way or the other, have been affected by this in the past year, impacting our learning, our ambitions, our friendships. Europe is opening up and we will be able to resume learning; building towards our future. This is not the case everywhere and our particular concern is with Nepal.  We started this petition as a group of students connected with different aid projects in Nepal, studying at the Geschwister-Scholl-Gymnasium in Freiberg; at the Abt-Bessel-Realschule in Buchen; at the Robert-Koch-Gymnasium in Clausthal-Zellerfeld; at the Heinrich-Heine-Gymnasium in Dortmund at the Gymnasium Olbernhau; and at the Grotius-College in Delft. But we plan to amplify our voice with students from all over Europe.

We have a deep affection for Nepal. We trust you share our concerns about the rapid escalation of COVID-19 cases in the country over the past few weeks and the humanitarian crisis that is creeping up. No doubt you are familiar with the facts, so we will just highlight a few: the positivity rate is near 50%; there are over 9,000 new cases a day; Nepal has less than 1.600 intensive care beds for a population of nearly 30 million; of the 185 hospitals in the country, only 26 have their own oxygen system, many inoperative. The Ministry of Health projects that the number of active cases could rise to 800,000 by July 15th. Those affected are significantly younger than during the first phase. Twenty percent are children and adolescents below 18. They could be us, or our younger brother and sister.

The health system has collapsed and without external help there is no hope for a recovery. To make things worse, recent research confirms that Nepal is in the grip of the new Indian variant, more contagious, and more lethal than any of the others. Without vaccines, many people will needlessly suffer and die.

We need to act. As a global leader, the EU needs to act. Nepal needs vaccines. Only 4% of the population have received at least one dose. Vaccines from neighbouring India – Nepal’s traditional vaccine supplier - are no longer available. The EU, however, has considerable doses of excess vaccines that it can divert without it affecting the EU’s own safety. The EU can also take the lead in a global movement for change that allows vaccines to be produced in more places. After all, none of us will be safe until all of us are safe. 

We also ask the EU to provide emergency humanitarian aid to Nepal, including equipment to support Nepal and its hospitals in manufacturing and delivering oxygen (such as bedside oxygen concentrators, oxygen cylinders, and liquid oxygen tanks), PPE, COVID-19 test kits, medicines and other vital medical supplies to support COVID-19 affected people.

We have learned since 2005 that a positive willingness, a YES to the question from students on whether they can help, can move mountains. After the severe earthquake in Nepal (2015), we collected over 750,000 EUR in donations and, together with our Nepalese project partners and friends, rebuilt seven destroyed schools and a kindergarten. We have learned to move something. But now Covid-19 takes us to the limit, and we, together with our fellow Nepali students, thus turn to you with the same question. “Can you help? Will you help?”

We call on you for your response to be an unequivocal yes.

Thank you.

 

Leonie Mann & Max Porstmann ~ Schülerfirma Namaste Nepal S-GmbH, Geschwister-Scholl-Gymnasium, Freiberg, Germany

Pauline Kuhn & Dean Mehl ~ Namaste Nepal S-AG, Abt-Bessel-Realschule, Buchen, Germany

Namaste Nepal Grotius, Grotius-College, Delft, The Netherlands

Tabea Otte & Maya Blome ~ Bato SEB Schülerfirma, Robert-Koch-Schule, Clausthal-Zellerfeld, Germany

Hannah Schmidt & Paul Henke ~ Nepal AG, Heinrich-Heine-Gymnasium, Dortmund, Germany

Nepalinitiative, Gymnasium Olbernhau, Olbernhau, Germany

Kusum Shrestha & Suman Gubaju ~ Kali Devi Secondary School, Gati, Nepal

Sabin Tamang & Sagar Tamang ~ Seti Devi Basic School,  Dandakateri, Nepal

Phursangbo Tamang & Himali Tamang ~ Gorakhnath Basic School, Mandra, Nepal

Bijaya Tamang & Niruta Tamang ~ Balhit Basic School, Sotang, Nepal

Subha Laxmi Tamang & Sameer Basneet ~ Singarche Basic School, Singarche, Nepal

Jiban Tamang & Dhan Bahadur Tamang ~ Namuna Simsar Basic School, Bugam, Nepal

Rasmita Tamang & Paras Tamang ~ Khada Devi Basic School, Kasheri, Nepal

Evana Pradhan & Sashwat Sharma ~ Ullens School, Lalitpur, Nepal

 

Contact us if you have any questions:

⤳ projektkoordinator@nepalfreiberg.de

⤳ www.nepalfreiberg.de

⤳ www.nnkathmandu.org.np

 

Note:
Funds donated to this petition go to Change.org, and not to Nepal. The organizers are not asking for a donation from signatories.