LETTERS: Despite being one of the worst infectious disease outbreaks the world has seen, the Covid-19 pandemic offers a unique learning experience to everyone, be it a medical doctor, the government or the public.
We saw many new roles being created, new daily rules to adhere to and a new norm in society such as wearing face masks. One great example that we can learn from is how the Orang Asli community in Malaysia has been responding to the Covid-19 pandemic.
The Orang Asli account for 178,197 of the country's 32.7 million total population. Between January and December last year, there were only 16 reported cases of Orang Asli testing positive for Covid-19 out of 113,010 total Covid-19 cases in Malaysia.
Despite this great feat, bear in mind that the numbers are not updated and there might be underreported cases due to them not having proper access to healthcare facilities and poor usage of MySejahtera.
To put into perspective, up to Aug 13 this year, one of the Kampung Orang Asli in Perak had reported 1,159 cases of Covid-19 with 12 deaths, which indicates that this kind of scenario may be common but just unreported.
Nevertheless, this serves as a great opportunity for us to understand and learn from the Orang Asli community on how they combat Covid-19 and how it may differ from the common public.
The Centre for Orang Asli Concerns (COAC) is a non-governmental organisation that drafted a protocol for Orang Asli to battle Covid-19.
According to protocol, every village should establish a Covid-Response Committee to manage Covid-related issues.
Members should familiarise themselves with standard operating procedures (SOP), modes of assistance, aid sources, quarantine protocols, as well as the ability to detect symptoms among community members and to recognise uncooperative behaviours in the community.
Barricades to limit movement of villagers and non-villagers have also been established. Villagers returning from outside, especially from Covid-confirmed areas, should be isolated from the rest of the community if non-entry is not an option.
For those returnees, whose status is unknown, they should self-isolate as per standard SOP. Ideally, each village should have its own quarantine facility or have close access to one.
This could be the village community centre, nearby school or place of worship. If available, staying in the "kebun" or forest-hut is also acceptable. The local committee and community are responsible to find what works best for the villagers.
Apart from that, the committee needs to set up specific rules and procedures to enforce self-isolation in the village. Everyone in the community should be informed of a Covid-19 infected individual's status without stigmatising him or her.
The traditional cooperative responsibility, or co-responsibility, upheld by the community should be a guide for the villagers to comply with the official and local SOP.
However, these alone are not adequate for them to combat the pandemic. As such, Orang Asli still face additional layers of obstacles in dealing with Covid-19 that create conditions that increase their vulnerability towards Covid-19 virus transmissibility and fatality.
For example, crowded-living conditions within the Orang Asli community increase the risk of spreading the infection. Additionally, they have higher risk of developing serious illnesses from Covid-19 due to a higher rate of chronic health conditions.
Health inequities are further marked by the lack of access to healthcare, types of occupation, gender, age, poor social capital, lower levels of education and literacy, religion and biased beliefs.
Besides, supply and access factors of vaccines are a challenge for Orang Asli to tackle Covid-19. As the whole world is eager to get vaccinated, there are times that vaccines are unavailable or lacking.
There is also an inconvenience of the vaccination process for Orang Asli who live in remote or interior areas of the country. Moreover, lack of Internet access makes them less aware of the digitised process such as vaccine registration through MySejahtera, news and latest SOP regarding Covid-19.
The indigenous people are in dire need of attention as they are secluded from the community outside. It is difficult for them to go out and seek help, so instead of that, we should get into their community and offer our help.
Vaccination should and can be done at their own houses to make it easier for them rather than asking them to come out to the vaccination centre.
They need better exposure to understand the disease itself because they are separated from us. Manpower is needed to help out and educate them about the disease and vaccination.
The only solution to tackle this is by approaching them. An interesting way to do that is by bringing back the mobile vaccination programme like what was done back in August. However, instead of targeting only the rural areas in big cities, we should also target these indigenous people who live deep in the forest.
Living in this pandemic era, it is important to ensure that Covid-19 literacy and prevention are equal in the population, including the minority groups such as the Orang Asli population.
The COAC played an important role in drafting the protocol for the Orang Asli to tackle Covid-19.
Out of the 178,197 Orang Asli, only 16 cases of Covid-19 were reported between January and December last year.
However, the Orang Asli community is likely to be hit harder if affected by contagious illnesses due to their higher burden of disease and other socio-economic factors.
In short, help is needed to educate and give them better exposure to the disease itself. In order to eradicate and free ourselves from this pandemic, everyone in Malaysia needs to get proper education and exposure to the disease, including the indigenous people.
Nor Syahidah Sazli Nehemiah Tan Shin Yong Nik Abdul Muhaimin N Hisham Chin Yew Shun Mardhiahtul Nadhrah Fasihah Md Nazri Teh Le Ni Teh Ru En Lim Wei Hang Dr Nur Afiqah Mohd Salleh
Faculty of Medicine, Universiti Malaya
The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect those of the New Straits Times