MIRI, July 10: Nearly 1,000 firemen statewide are involved in transporting patients during the Movement Control Order (MCO) period, following the Covid-19 pandenic, with 15 missions carried out, says State Fire and Rescue Department director Khirudin Drahman.
He disclosed that 33 patients have been transported during these missions, including persons under investigation (PUI) for Covid-19.
“As part of the frontliners, this was among the risks that we have to face while carrying out our duty for the community, but we tried to minimise the exposure,” he said during a media conference after presenting excellence service awards (APC) to 51 firemen at Curtin University Malaysia campus’s auditorium in Senadin here today.
He added that a lot of people were not aware of what firemen had to deal with during the period.
“To reduce public tension (during that period of MCO) we carried out the mission (transporting patients) during night time,” he added.
On the disaster relief efforts in combating Covid-19 for Miri division, Khirudin said 58 missions were carried out, whereby firemen helped in delivering food packs to the community during that period.
“Our main challenge in the first stage of the mission was the lack of adequate transportation facilities (helicopters) to ferry the food supplies to the remote areas, but we eventually overcome those difficulties,” he explained.
Also present at the ceremony, which saw the 51 recipients from zone 4,5,6 and 7 in Miri receiving their APC, were Fire and Rescue assistant director PgKB I Tiong Ling Hii and head of Zone 6 Miri PgKB I Law Poh Kiong.-DayakDaily
