To date, a total of 2 people have succumbed to heatstroke so far this year due to the El Nino phenomenon.
23-year-old Wan Mohd Aliff Faisal Wan Ismedi, a trainee of the basic course for young volunteer servicemen, who died on Tuesday (26th April) at a polytechnic in Jitra, Kedah.
The first death from heatstroke occurred last month – a police trainee constable, 23-year-old Azizan Ayon, who died in Segamat, Johor. According to Health director-general Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah, 6 other trainees of the young volunteer servicemen course also suffered heatstroke and were treated as outpatients.
On top of that, the health ministry as of yesterday recorded 200 cases related to the heat.
In Pahang, he said, there was a case of heatstroke also on Tuesday at an institution of higher learning which required intensive care while 8 other people suffered from heat exhaustion following exposure to extreme heat during outdoor activities. This group of students reportedly participated in a national-level endurance competition that tested their physical resilience.
“One case of heatstroke and 2 cases of heat exhaustion were treated at Sultan Ahmad Shah Hospital in Temerloh, 5 cases of heat exhaustion were referred to Jengka Hospital and one case was treated as outpatient at a clinic of an institution of higher learning in Pahang,” he said.
All these cases were among the 200 cases related to heat treated at government health facilities – 52 of them heat cramps, 126, heat exhaustion and 22, heatstroke.
Stay indoors as much as possible, peeps. Keep yourself in check with our precautionary guideline on what warning signs to look out for as well as advice on how to cope during this dry spell.
In other news, the searing weather has also caused a sudden spike in snake bite cases in the country. Hospitals in Malaysia have recorded 730 cases of snake bites since January, with Kedah recording 195 cases and Perak with 107 cases. There has been one fatality recorded so far, on 19th April, when a 7-year-old girl from SK Dato’ Hashim 1 in Kelantan died after being bitten by a snake.
Source: Bernama / Featured image: South China Morning Post.
