(TibetanReview.net, May22’19) – With sirens blaring, a motorcade, complete with ambulance, sped its way out of His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s residence on May 21. It turned out, however, that the Tibetan leader was in perfect health, meeting with some 130 visiting devotees from Vietnam for the second day. The motorcade turned out to be an emergency drill carried out by the district administration to prepare for possible future emergencies.
People and mediapersons made frantic calls to the authorities to enquire about the well-being of the Dalai Lama, reported tribuneindia.com May 22. Kangra District Superintendent of Police, Santosh Patial, has explained that it was a mock drill to evacuate the Dalai Lama in case of medical emergency.
The report cited the office of HH the Dalai Lama as allaying fears regarding the Tibetan leader’s health, maintaining that the 84-year-old leader only had minor and manageable age-related problems.
Regarding previous rumours suggesting that he had last-stage prostate cancer, the report cited Secretary Chhime Rigzing as reiterating that doctors at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, had identified the cancer and treated him two years ago and no trace of it was found during a follow-up examination.
Personal physician Dr Tseten Dorjee has explained that the Dalai Lama needed support while walking because of a mild osteo-arthritis, which is common to people of his age. The condition of his arthritis was so mild that it did not even require surgery, he was reported to have added.
