What the Heck Is Going On with the Mount Everest Poisoning Scandal?

My 83-year-old father texted this to me the other day: I just read the story about the fraud where Mount Everest guides made climbers sick with baking soda. Sounds really bad.  

My dad’s text is, of course, related to the recent report alleging that multiple trekking companies defrauded international insurance companies by calling in false reports, hiring helicopters for unnecessary rescues, and, gulp, potentially even causing their clients to get sick. This story has generated headlines across the globe, including plenty here in the USA. I agree with my father—the whole thing sounds bad. Like, super-duper mega-ultra bad.

But the way that a growing number of U.S. media outlets has covered this story paints a picture in the minds of most Americans that is even worse.

We envision our intrepid Everest climber inching his way up the Hilary Step, pushing deep into the Death Zone toward the summit. Suddenly, he is overcome by gastrointestinal distress and collapses just shy of the top, all because some dastardly Sherpa spiked his morning goulash with the stuff your nephew used to make his science fair volcano erupt.

Yeah—terrible stuff.

But, like all mainstream stories involving Mount Everest, there’s a huge gap between reality, how U.S. media presents it to us, and then how these stories rattle around in our brains (sorry, Dad). We all remember the story this past October of the blizzard that, according to headlines, trapped 800 people on Mount Everest. Turns out none of these 800 people were anywhere near Mount Everest.

Thus, here is a helpful explainer for what’s actually happening over in Nepal.

OK, so what type of wrongdoing is alleged by this report in Nepal?

This roots of this story go way back to 2018. That year, a reporter named Annabel Symington with Agence France-Presse published a groundbreaking investigative story about fraud within the country’s trekking industry. These are companies that take tourists on guided hikes into the Himalayas, including on a trip to Everest Base Camp.

This industry supports a growing business of helicopter transports and helicopter ambulances, because a certain percentage of these hikers must be evacuated from areas that can only be reached by foot or air.

Symington showed that some of these tour operators and helicopter companies were successfully orchestrating an elaborate fraud scheme. Hikers get tired at high altitudes. Others get altitude sickness or diarrhea. Normally, the cure is to simply walk these people back down to lower elevations where they can rest and recover. But these operators convinced the tourists to call for a helicopter evacuation, because some international insurance companies cover the costs of these services.

It’s not a big deal, just call for a helicopter rescue, your insurance company will pay for it is my translation of the advice these trekking companies gave their stricken hikers.

Alleged in the reporting: the helicopter transport companies and even some private hospitals, would then charge these insurance companies exorbitant fees for the emergency services. Everyone involved—the hiking company, the guide, the pilot, and even the hospital—would allegedly receive a kickback from the payout. And as more insurance companies were forced to pay up, companies saw an opportunity for a quick buck. More of them convinced their hiking clients to call for a helicopter, even if they didn’t really need one.

Symington herself posed as a hiking client and saw how engrained in the business this process had become. She also trekked up to Everest Base Camp and met a girl who was waiting for a helicopter rescue, even though she didn’t really need one.

Symington’s story, and reports by Nepali media, led to a government inquiry, and later some reforms to the trekking industry. Nepal made a rule requiring trekking companies and helicopter rescue companies to the country’s Tourist Search and Rescue Committee, as well as the Tourist Police and Department of Tourism.

Problem solved, right? Well, not exactly.

In 2025 the Nepal’s Central Investigation Bureau (CIB) announced it was reopening an investigation into allegations of fraud. Then, in January, the CIB arrested six people from the trekking and mountain rescue industries and charged them with continuing the fraud.

“The scam continued due to lax punitive action,” Manoj Kumar KC, chief of the Central Investigation Bureau (CIB), told The Kathmandu Post. 

The CIB released the details of its most recent investigation in March. And yes, in one of the instances cited in the document, someone allegedly added baking powder to a tourist’s food to give them a tummy ache. That is the extent of the poisoning.

Now, the CIB is trying to prosecute 33 people involved in alleged scams.

So, like, how many instances of Fraud are there?

According to the CIB, this thing was substantial. Between 2022 and 2025, investigators identified 171 cases of fake rescues, out of a total of 4,782 patients who were treated at hospitals implicated in the scheme. That’s means about 3.5 percent of the cases they examined were fraudulent.

The CIB also examined helicopter flights from three transport companies implicated during this time and determined that of 317 of the 2,320 flights (13.6 percent) were fraudulent.

In one case, four hikers were “rescued” on the same helicopter flight. But the company billed the insurance companies for four individual flights, totaling $31,000. A private flight from Lukla to Kathmandu normally costs $2,500.

Sheesh, that sounds pretty bad. 

Yep, it’s not great. The most recent Kathmandu Post story  has plenty of anecdotes and additional reporting that sheds light on the size and scope of the fraud.

OK, but like, how many Mount Everest climbers got caught up in this thing?

Zero.

What?

Yeah, this fraud concerns hikers, not Mount Everest climbers.

What’s the difference?

Hundreds of thousands of people go to Nepal every year to go on guided hiking trips. About 500 people go to Nepal to try to summit Mount Everest. There’s a big difference between hikers and climbers.

Oh. 

Yeah. Trekking to Mount Everest Base Camp is what Aunt Janet and Uncle Ron did for their 20th anniversary. Climbing Mount Everest is what Dave your dentist—you know, the guy who races Ironman and ultramarathons—is training for.

But, like, the fraud involved people on their way to Mount Everest, right?

Some of them were headed to Base Camp. Others were hiking in Nepal’s other world-class hiking areas: the Annapurna Circuit, or the Manaslu Circuit, or in the Langtang Valley, or in any of the other awesome trekking valleys and trails that dot the Himalayas.

And the people doing the fraud are Mount Everest guides, right?

No, they are trekking guides.

What’s the difference?

These days most guides on Mount Everest are seasoned professionals with years of mountaineering experience on the peak or on other mountains. Most have some type of accreditation with Nepal National Mountain Guide Association, or other IFMGA bodies.

Trekking guides, meanwhile, are more like tour guides with a backpack and some hiking poles. They also need a business license and a permit for their trip, but you don’t need to scale the face of a glacier to obtain those.

Well, what about the headlines I saw in The New York Post and People?

Yeah, well, therein lies the challenge with all things Mount Everest. If something dramatic, zany, or interesting happens near Mount Everest, then the mountain is absolutely going to end up in the headline. My dad read about it, after all.

Why?

Blame Into Thin Air. Blame the 2015 movie Everest. Blame past Outside stories. Blame whatever you like. For whatever reason, Americans love to read about climbers on Mount Everest pooping their pants, getting caught in storms, stumbling through trash, or yeah, getting defrauded.

It’s schadenfreude at 29,000 feet.