Frontliners must be fully protected, says MTUC
The Star
PETALING JAYA: The MTUC is calling on the authorities to implement effective measures to protect all frontline workers, especially those from the aviation and healthcare sectors, against the influenza A(H1N1) virus.
MTUC president Syed Shahir Syed Mohamud said employers must also be committed to giving assistance to workers who have been placed under home or hospital quarantine as well as their families.
“If clinic staff or airport workers and flight attendants are quarantined for coming in contact with the two infected patients, they should be paid the full salary,” said Syed Shahir.
“We are very concerned with the outbreak of various diseases in several parts of the country and want the authorities to seriously look into practices associated with the preservation of good health among the general public,” he said.
Syed Shahir expressed the hope that employers would educate workers on how to improve personal hygiene and keeping their work environment clean at all times.
In Port Klang, port workers expressed concern for the lack of protective measures against the virus outbreak, reports Bernama.
Union of Employees of Port Ancillary Services Supplies (Unepass) secretary A. Balasubramaniam said thousands of frontliners serving incoming ships from all over the world had not been given adequate protection.
The Health Ministry, he claimed, was concentrating more on airports and other passenger entry points and gave low priority to ports.
“There are no screening machines or stringent health checks at the ports, thus workers and ship crew are coming in contact with each other without proper screening,” he said, adding it was causing concern to the port community now that Malaysia had two confirmed cases of influenza A(H1N1).
Balasubramaniam, who is also MTUC vice-president, called on the ministry not to neglect the health and welfare of port workers and issue proper guidelines and information to them.
He said the port authorities and the Health Department needed to conduct intensive campaigns among port workers to increase awareness on the disease and other communicable diseases that could be brought into the country by foreign ship crew members.
