KUALA LUMPUR: Nine out of 75 people scheduled to be flown home from Wuhan, China on Wednesday could not make it due to various reasons including health, work and logistical issues.
In the second mission to bring back those stranded in Wuhan following the Covid-19 outbreak, only 66 of them, comprising 46 Malaysian citizens and 20 of their non-citizen family members, were on AirAsia Flight AK8265 from Tianhe International Airport in Wuhan, which took off at 1.45am and arrived at the Kuala Lumpur International Airport at 6.45am.
The National Disaster Management Agency (Nadma) said six of the nine could not board the aircraft due to health issues after the screening process held at the airport.
“The remaining three involve one person who did not turn up at the airport due to health factors; another cannot make it because of work commitments and the other one has difficulty finding transport to go to the airport,” it said in a statement.
After the health screening at the Air Disaster Unit (ADU), everyone on board flight AK8265 was required to undergo the decontamination process and change into hospital attire before being sent to the Higher Education Leadership Academy where they would be monitored. The clothes that they wore from Wuhan would be cleaned in accordance to proper procedures.
“For those who fail the health screening, they will be sent to the designated hospitals immediately. At the monitoring centre, supervised by healthcare workers from the Health Ministry, they (those on board flight AK8265) will have no contact with those outside including their families. For security reason, police will be guarding the centre.
“Health screening will be done twice a day to be absolutely sure they are healthy and can be discharged after the monitoring period.
“Nadma has and in the process of contacting immediate families (of those on board AK8265) to inform them of their arrival and the monitoring processes that must be done,” it said.
It was learnt all 66 had passed the health screening at ADU.
In the first humanitarian aid mission carried out by the Malaysian government on Feb 4, 107 stranded in Hubei province were flown home. They comprised 88 Malaysians and 19 non-citizens, who are their spouses and children.