KUALA LUMPUR, August 25 — Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said today that he has instructed the Ministry of Health’s (MOH) finance department to immediately address complaints of months’ delay in the payment of allowances for Sungai Buloh Hospital doctors.
During his press conference today on daily Covid-19 cases, the Health director-general said that this issue — which was first highlighted on CodeBlue by a Sungai Buloh Hospital medical officer — was not raised to his attention.
“This is not right to our officers on the ground, especially the frontliners, so this will be addressed by our administration,” Dr Noor Hisham told a reporter, who asked him about Sungai Buloh Hospital medical officers who are yet to receive their relocation, on-call, and Covid-19 allowances.
The reporter was referring to an anonymous letter published by CodeBlue yesterday from a Sungai Buloh Hospital contract medical officer who claimed that medical officers at the MOH hospital have yet to receive their relocation allowance, since they were transferred from other hospitals to Sungai Buloh Hospital last March to be on the frontline of the Covid-19 response. These medical officers are now again being transferred this month back to their original placements.
The doctor also claimed that medical officers at Sungai Buloh Hospital — the main Covid-19 facility in the country located in Selangor — have not received their on-call allowance or Covid-19 special allowance for the month of June.
The medical officer said that doctors have been pushing their hospital’s finance unit regarding their relocation allowance for the past few months, but the finance unit would always say that the claims have not been processed or that it has just received all the forms last week.
Bandar Kuching MP Dr Kelvin Yii (DAP) and Seberang Jaya assemblyman Dr Afif Bahardin (Bersatu) have also voiced out and urged MOH to resolve the delayed payment of the various allowances for medical officers from Sungai Buloh Hospital.
“But it’s not the whole hospital, I think certain officers. I was told that the submission of the claims were not complete, but I think we need to look into the details and facilitate as soon as possible,” Dr Noor Hisham said, stressing that this issue has to be addressed as soon as possible.
