COVID-19: Malaysian doctors in UK get British govt's attention

Foreign medical practitioners, including Malaysians, who are serving in the United Kingdom are being given full attention by the British government in their fight to combat the COVID-19 pandemic.

Executive director of the London Executive and Professional Development Centre, Professor Dr Kanesh Rajah said the British government emphasised their welfare aspect to ensure the medical sector will not be paralysed.

"Increasingly, the government is ensuring all the medical staff, especially the frontliners treating patients with the virus or suspected with the virus are fully protected, but as we know there are still some work that need to be done there. So they need to be cautious, but largely the medical fraternity are well protected," he said.

He told Bernama TV when contacted following news on the death due to COVID-19 of a Malaysian doctor, Dr R. Vishna, a consultant neonatologist at the Birmingham Women's Hospital of the United Kingdom.

He was reported to be one of the COVID-19 victims in the United Kingdom, where the death toll now is approaching 20,000.

The Birmingham Women and Children NHS Foundation Trust, in a post on its official website last Friday , stated that Dr Vishna, 48, left a wife, Liza and daughter, Katelyn. However, his origin in Malaysia is uncertain.

The death has caused concern for medical practitioners serving in the National Health Service in the country.

Commenting on the low rate of pandemic recovery in Britain, Dr Kanesh, said it was due to several factors.

"From about March 23, the government decided not to release any figures concerning the recovery rate. Therefore, any figures published on the recovery rate is not based on actual figures.

"It's primarily the government having difficulty in collecting the data, not only from the hospital, but also from the wider community, for example the Care Home and so on," he added.

-- BERNAMA