KUALA LUMPUR: The second mission to bring home stranded Malaysians in Wuhan, China went smoothly as it brought home 66 individuals from the province severely affected by the Covid-19 outbreak.
The success of the second mission was due to good cooperation between various government agencies namely the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Health, Fire and Rescue Department, Royal Malaysia Police, Civil Defence Force and Immigration Department.
The Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HADR) mission began with AirAsia’s special aircraft departing Kuala Lumpur Airport 2 (klia2) at 5.58pm on Tuesday to bring home Malaysians and their family members from Wuhan.
The special flight arrived at KL International Airport (KLIA) at 6.45am yesterday carrying 66 individuals, comprising 46 Malaysians and 20 of their non-Malaysian spouses/children.
They were accompanied by 12 flight crew members, nine representatives from government agencies in Malaysia and two officials from the Malaysian embassy in Beijing.
“The Malaysian government would like to thank all those involved in ensuring the humanitarian assistance mission to bring home Malaysians and their family members went smoothly,” said the National Disaster Management Agency (Nadma) in a statement yesterday.
Nadma is the HADR mission coordinator.
The first HADR mission on Feb 4 had brought home 107 individuals comprising 88 Malaysians and 19 of their non-Malaysians family members.
Both missions were conducted in cooperation with Malaysia Airports Holdings Bhd and AirAsia.
Nadma said good relations and close cooperation between the governments of Malaysian and China are also among key contributors to the success of the HADR mission.
It said initially, 75 individuals had registered with the Malaysian embassy in China to return home, however, nine did not board the plane with six of them due to failing health screenings conducted by the Chinese authorities at the airport.
The other three individuals cited health reason, work commitment and inability to leave Wuhan due to logistic issue, respectively.
Nadma said upon arriving at KLIA, the evacuees were subjected to decontamination before being taken to the Air Disaster Unit (ADU) for the health screening process prior to being sent to the Surveillance Centre at the Higher Education Leadership Academy (AKEPT) in Bandar Enstek, Negeri Sembilan for a 14-day quarantine.
At AKEPT, they will be monitored by health officials from the Ministry of Health and undergo health screenings twice daily.
They will be allowed to return home once the surveillance process completed.
“During this quarantine period, their contact will be limited to health personnel, and no contact with outsiders including family members is allowed,” it said.
Those who failed the health screenings will be sent to Tuanku Jaafar Hospital in Seremban.
The agency is also in the midst of contacting the evacuees next-of-kin to inform the arrival of their family members as well as explain the surveillance process, it said.
As at 8am yesterday, Covid-19 positive cases in Malaysia remains at 22 with 20 of them have fully recovered. — Bernama