Traffic is gradually returning to the roads of the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) with certain restrictions and security measures still in place. Twenty-two security checkpoints are reported to have been installed along the Qinghai-Tibet highway, the Sichuan-Tibet highway and the China-Nepal highway alone; the main terrestrial traffic arteries into and out of the TAR. Further checkpoints have been installed on secondary roads.
Travellers have reported being stopped at checkpoints about every 50 kilometres, at which passengers are subjected to body temperature tests; vehicles and their loads are sprayed with aerosol disinfectant. Similar measures are being applied at the entrances to several towns. Trucks which had been banned from entering Lhasa for several days can now be seen again in the streets, though still in smaller numbers than is normal, as this is the time of year when there is typically a resurgence of passenger and goods traffic.
This is also the beginning of the pilgrimage season in Tibet. Despite the SARS emergency, the number of Tibetans who have decided to undertake a pilgrimage has not decreased this year, though their journeys are likely to be much slower. Pilgrims can be observed at many checkpoints, patiently enduring medical checks. A pilgrim encampment is forming close to Namtso-lake, about 100 kilometres north of Lhasa. This year, the lake is a major pilgrim destination connected to the festival of Saga Dawa (the anniversary of the birth, death and enlightenment of the Buddha), which will take place in June.
At the climax of the SARS-crisis, the authorities in Lhasa had declared that inbound flights from Gonkar Airport close to the Tibetan capital would be cancelled. While this regulation seems not to have been implemented, the number of arriving passengers is said to have declined considerably. The temperatures of inbound passengers are systematically checked using manual infra-red thermometers sent by the Civil Aviation Administration of China. These instruments emit an acoustic signal when they detect abnormal body temperature. Anyone whose body temperature sets off the alarm is tested again with a conventional thermometer.
Most foreigners have left Lhasa except for a few backpackers. The borders are still closed for tourism and an official declaration has stated that they will remain so for at least one month. Chinese tourists are also largely absent.
From 1 to 7 May, an anti-SARS work supervision group sent by the central government (State Council) inspected various hospitals, traffic hubs, medical centres and pharmaceutical stores, as well as some residential areas in Lhasa City and Lhoka Prefecture. The supervision group is said to have generated considerable agitation among local cadres. Most people in administrative offices wear protection masks.
Zhao Bingli, head of the supervision group and deputy minister of the State Population and Family Planning Commission, said that the party committee and government of Tibet intend to “keep the SARS virus out of the gate of Tibet”. He also admitted that, due to the poor medical infrastructure in the TAR, with extremely limited medical resources and “short supply and relatively low quality” of medical personnel, should the epidemic enter Tibet, “the consequences will be too ghastly to contemplate”. There are no known cases of SARS so far in the TAR. Other Tibetan regions seem also to have been spared to date. Two alleged cases have been reported, one at a military hospital and the other at the Minorities University, both in Xining, the capital of Qinghai province (known to Tibetans traditionally as Amdo), but these have not been confirmed and therefore do not appear in official statistics.
