Armed Forces deploys field hospital team, equipment to Turkiye

KUALA LUMPUR: The Malaysian Armed Forces (MAF) is arranging the level three deployment of teams and equipment from its field hospital, Hospital Medan Malaysia (HMM), to Turkiye for a period of six weeks, to provide humanitarian aid to earthquake victims in that country.

Chief of Defence Force Gen Tan Sri Affendi Buang said the wisdom and experience of those involved in Op Starlight would be able to help handle the current situation.

"I call on all those involved to be focused and prepared to face the physical and mental aspects (of the operation) in providing aid services to the earthquake victims,” he said in a speech at the Op Starlight 2 send-off ceremony at the Subang Air Base, here early Friday (Feb 10) morning.

The MAF headquarters, in a statement, said that the main aim of HMM's operation in Turkiye is to express the Malaysian government's wishes to provide humanitarian aid to victims affected by the disaster.

The operation involves 106 MAF staff, led by Brig Gen Datuk Dr Amran Amir Hamzah, as the operations commander, who will be deployed to Turkiye in three phases starting Friday, using an A400 aircraft as well as commercial aircraft, it said.

The HMM will be located in Adiyaman, with the help of coordination by the Turkish Embassy in Malaysia, the Foreign Ministry and the National Disaster Management Agency (Nadma).

The field hospital will have a capacity of 60 beds and will be equipped with ward facilities, an operating theatre, ICU (intensive care unit), radiology and laboratory.

It will offer nine specialist facilities namely primary medicine, orthopaedics, surgery, anaesthetics, maxillofacial (surgery), obstetrics and gynaecology, paediatrics and ophthalmology, as well as emergency medicine.

Through these facilities, HMM will focus on treatment services for earthquake victims.

An earthquake measuring 7.8 on the Richter scale, which hit southern Turkiye and northwestern Syria on Monday (Feb 6), has claimed thousands of lives. The effects of the earthquake were also reported to be felt in Cyprus and Lebanon.

On Tuesday (Feb 7), Turkiye declared a three-month state of emergency in 10 provinces, namely Adana, Adıyaman, Diyarbakir, Gaziantep, Hatay, Kahramanmaras, Kilis, Malatya, Osmaniye and Sanliurfa, to ensure the search and rescue operations run smoothly. - Bernama