Dr Musa Mohd Nordin
Terima kasih kepada Dr Musa Nordin dan Dr Azizi Omar dari Hospital Pakar KPJ Damansara kerana meraikan ‘setiakawan’ pada saat yang sangat genting. Ini ‘teladan’ yang baik kepada orangramai. Berikut adalah surat yang dihantar kepada NST dan disiarkan pada 11 April 2020.
In praise of Malaysia’s efforts
(NST 11 April in Letter)
We wish to record our praise and appreciation of our dedicated colleagues in the healthcare professions in confronting the current pandemic that has brought deaths and sufferings to many.
We salute too the brave members of the police and armed forces and other essential service providers who together form a strong frontline in this fight.
They have been marshalled by competent experts, headed by the tireless and commanding Director- General of Health Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah.
This team of experts knows thoroughly the sciences involved and are guided by evidence-based thinking. They exude confidence and have succeeded in giving faith to the rakyat.
Every evening, we are transfixed in front our TV sets listening attentively to our D-G of Health. And at the end of every presentation in the past week or so, we have the feeling that we are moving in the right direction.
We now know that the virus is among us in the community. We know that the Movement Control Order is the right weapon against it. We each need to be disciplined. We need to realise that the rights of the community not to be harmed should not be disrespected by the few who elect to be foolish.
We know also that we need to prevent further invasion through our borders.
We have been quick and ready to deal with this and all returnees are swabbed and quarantined. We know this drastic and bothersome action on some will protect many more people in our community.
We know too that each of us has a responsibility to keep ourselves and loved ones safe. We must declare to our healthcare workers if we have been exposed to the virus through contacts with infected individuals.
We may now be more proactive in fighting the spread of the pandemic by getting ourselves and loved ones tested if we feel uncomfortable with our state of health.
But how does Malaysia compare with others around the world?
To answer the above question, we looked at published figures (as of April 6, 2020) and computed several measures in public health and epidemiology.
We note that compared with many countries, Malaysian figures stand shoulder to shoulder with the best. Of course, the figures are dynamic and may change as the pandemic progresses.
So what have we and similar countries done right?
Our figures indicated Malaysia reacted well to early warnings of the pandemic. The relatively low figure suggests that we managed to implement effective primary prevention methods in a timely manner.
The public was educated early and once the first case appeared, we implemented measures to track, test, isolate and treat.
It is important to emphasise that although the virulence of the virus is the same worldwide, the case fatality rates have differed between countries.
Thus there are factors that have come into play to influence the outcome. Tops among these are our capacity to treat diagnosed patients in hospitals using systematic evidence-based treatment approaches to patients with lung infections.
We hope the promising trends in our figures are maintained. Each Malaysian has a role to play to achieve this.
Moving forward, there are valuable lessons already learned and yet to be learned from this pandemic. Malaysia must now reflect deeply on how important it is to strengthen our healthcare sector.
Countries that have developed their healthcare systems to be highly efficient based mainly on financial considerations in peacetime may now be seen to flounder in pandemics and natural disasters.
Perhaps it is time to make a heartfelt mental note that we, healthcare leaders, need to take care of our own. We must rewrite our narrative on the state of our manpower needs for a country aspiring to head towards the status of a developed country.
We need more doctors and not fewer. And then we must support, train and engage with a touch of parental kindness our junior doctors and other healthcare professionals who will replace us in future fights.
Kudos to all involved in this fight. May you all be blessed.
Prof Datuk Dr Azizi Omar
Datuk Dr Musa Mohd Nordin
KPJ Damansara Specialist Hospital
Author / Editor
