From front line heroes to outcasts

Tight-knit team: Volunteers watching a video on a phone at their temporary base in Taungoo district in Myanmar’s Bago region, from where they are working to treat and bury Covid-19 victims. — AFP

A Buddhist monk and a budding sailor are among the outcasts squatting in an abandoned building in Myanmar while they help bury coronavirus victims and their worried families tell them to keep away.

A surge in infections across the country has been aggravated by a lack of formal medical care, with many hospitals empty of staff joining strikes against the military coup.