Noor Hisham: Health Ministry needs volunteers to fight 3rd wave of pandemic

 

COVID-19 | The Health Ministry is in need of volunteers to help fight the Covid-19 pandemic in Sabah, according to its director-general.

Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said today that, to date, they have mobilised 767 doctors and other ministry staff to battle Covid-19 in Sabah since the state started recording a spike in the number of cases last month.

However, the number is still not sufficient as the ministry has to operate 19 quarantine centres and conduct public health activities on the ground. This is on top of the operations of nine hospitals designated for Covid-19 cases.

"In normal circumstances, we have enough human resources to provide health services.

"Now, we are in a crisis. And we have 19 centres for quarantine and low-risk treatment. So we need extra manpower to conduct services in these centres and also on the ground," he told a press conference aired live via Facebook this evening.

Noor Hisham was answering a question about his call for volunteers to join the ministry, which was posted on his Facebook page yesterday.

According to him, the Health Ministry uses both the 'whole government' and 'whole society' approach in order to battle the pandemic.

"So we are open to the whole society approach, that's why we are calling for volunteers and NGOs who want to contribute to join us, especially at the low-risk quarantine centres.

"This is a war that we are facing. And we can do this together," he said.

Yesterday, Noor Hisham posted on Facebook calling for non-ministry personnel from medical and healthcare backgrounds to join them in facing the third wave of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Those sought after include doctors, microbiologists, environmental health officers, nurses, and medical assistants, among others. - Mkini