Press Statement By Tony Chiew:
The Publicity Secretary of DAP Bintulu, Chiew Chan Yew is calling for the Ministry of Health (KKM) to expedite the process to resolve shortage of medical personnel throughout the state.
According to Chiew, this is vital in order for the state to effectively fight against the COVID-19 pandemic, especially with the situation getting worst and the number of positive cases reclining in the past few weeks.
“This COVID-19 pandemic has been with us for over a year. But until now, the government has yet to resolve problem of insufficient healthcare personnel. In fact, we don’t even have enough ambulance drivers.
“Our medical staffs are exhausted from having to fight in the battlefield with insufficient manpower. Even the people are worn out by this situation,” he said.
He added that while medical staffs are trying their very best to fight this pandemic, the shortage of manpower is affecting them physically and mentally.
“This should not have happened. The Government must mitigate the situation and implement measures to provide our medical staff with better working environment. This is important to enable them perform their duty well, even in today’s tough situation,” he said.
Chiew added that issues concerning shortage of medical staff have been around since mid of last year (2020).
In fact, Sarawak also reported that it has a ‘severe shortage of medical staff’ a few months ago and had submitted a list of 1436 medical staff needed. Unfortunately, only 430 was provided by the ministry.
“The amount provided is less than sufficient. It’s not even half of the number of medical personnel needed. The responsibility is truly on the shoulder of those policymakers.”
Medical staff are not slaves. Any incident or accident which can happen following this shortage will reflect the negligence of the relevant ministers as decision makers.
“The government must expedite all measures to resolve this manpower shortage and do what is necessary to boost the confidence of these healthcare workers in fighting this pandemic.”
“It is vital for the Government to act on this immediatly, as this can also prevent fatique among our front-liners as well as avoid the issue from being used as an excuse in negligence by policymakers,” he stressed.
Chiew pointed out that since Pakatan Nasional took over, the country is not only facing shortage of medical personnels, but even also school teachers.
He believed that the government has been given enough time to resolve all these problems, yet until now, the problems still arise. Because of this, it is only natural for the people to be disappointed.
“Therefore, we want the government of the day to be reminded that, if they continue to close an eye to their own inabilities or failures in carrying out their responsibility to the people, as well as blame others for their own weaknesses, this situation we are in right now, will continue to plague us. All these unsolved problems will only worsen our present situation,” lamented Chiew.
