22 July

Union Minister Dr Win Myat Aye, in his capacity as the Secretary of the National Volunteer Steering Unit, held a videoconference with volunteers and members of civil society organizations assisting in COVID-19 measures across the nation yesterday.

Participants from Chin State, Rakhine State, Mon State and Taninthayi Region joined the meeting and discussed of areas of cooperation, challenges faced, and finding solutions to related issues.

During the meeting, the Union Minister said while COVID-19 is no longer spreading as noticeably as before domestically, people returning from abroad may be carrying the disease and thus putting them in quarantine is important. He thanked everyone assisting and urged volunteers to assist the Ministry of Social Welfare, Relief and Resettlement in social security, disaster prevention, response and rehabilitation processes. He said there would be different challenges and necessities between the states and regions and asked for participants to voice those differences.

The meeting then started with discussions on the language barrier preventing effective dissemination of COVID-19 information among various ethnic regions, the difficulty of transporting water, food, and lab samples of people in quarantine across Chin State due to inadequate infrastructure, the need for vehicle fuel, the need for cash assistance to purchase food for people in quarantine the longer COVID-19 stretches on, proper management of illegal routes of entry, especially routes by water, requesting supplies of face masks, hand sanitizers, gloves and PPE outfits when schools reopen, equipping schools with foot-operated waste bins, organizing additional courses for disaster management and volunteers, and support from the Union Government to the long-term assistance by volunteers and philanthropic organizations in COVID-19 measures.

The Union Minister responded by saying his ministry will swiftly address the issues that can be resolved immediately and coordinate with other relevant departments to address the other issues.

MNA (Translated by Zaw Htet Oo)