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IPOH (Bernama): Claims of a mysterious illness in Sekolah Tuanku Abdul Rahman (STAR) here that went viral on social media Tuesday (April 16) are not true as it is just an Influenza A(H1N1) infection, it was revealed Wednesday (April 17).

Perak Health, Consumer Affairs, Civil Society and Human Resource Committee chairman A. Sivanesan (pic) said 79 students, aged from 13 to 17, and a teacher were found to have fever and cough yesterday.

He said two of the students were admitted to a private hospital for treatment and observation and one of them was discharged today. The rest received outpatient treatment.

“They are all reported to be in stable condition. Twenty-eight of them were isolated. Four of the those with cough were confirmed to be Influenza A(H1N1) positive.

“The situation in the school is under control,” he told a press conference at the Bangunan Perak Darul Ridzan.

Sivanesan was asked to comment on a Facebook post that claimed that 100 students from the school were afflicted by a mysterious illness, with many of them coughing, vomiting and having a fever, which prompted their parents to take them home from the all-male residential school.

He said the Kinta District Health Office had taken measures to prevent the spread of the infection, including isolating the sick students.

As a means of checking infection, the public is advised to take preventive measures, including getting treatment at the clinic or hospital for influenza symptoms such as fever, cough and sore throat.

“Stay home during the period when you have the symptoms and reduce the number of meetings with friends or relatives, avoid public places such as shopping centres, schools, kindergartens or workplaces and do not attend public events,” he said.

TODAY is April 2, and while it’s yet another Tuesday to most of us, it’s also World Autism Awareness Day.

As such, we now have a chance to show our support for people living with the challenges of autism, their families and perhaps even organisations out there that show them their due respect and empower them.

This is why I am highlighting Care2Run and the work they do every Sunday at Taman Aman in Petaling Jaya to help children, teenagers and young adults with autism, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), Down Syndrome among other challenges.

Speaking to Care2Run co-founder Prem Kumar Ramadas, I got a better idea of how Care2Run operates and why it meets every Sunday to help people with intellectual challenges.

He said that Care2Run began in 2015, and shared with me how it began working with children and youth with learning challenges.

“We did research beforehand to find out what was needed by the community in Petaling Jaya and found that there was an under-served community in schools from dysfunctional and poor families that did not belong to a welfare home,” said Prem.

“In the beginning it was predominantly for high-risk children, eventually parents who saw us while we were working with children at the University of Malaya asked us if we could work with children with learning challenges. That was the beginning of phase two for Care2Run,” he added.

Prem said that Care2Run had operated at several places before coming to Taman Aman, adding that they shifted to Taman Aman as the park is very friendly for people with disabilities.

He also said that Care2Run worked with three schools up to 2018 as part of the school’s co-curricular activities – SMK Sri Permata, SMK Kelana Jaya and SMK Sunway.

“We are going to be expanding to different schools which have students with learning challenges in 2019. Currently we are working with adolescents with learning challenges who are not with any schools. Those in our programme right now came in through word of mouth,” said Prem.

He explained that on an average Sunday, Care2Run aims to support 20 youth with learning challenges from the age of nine to 34 and support is on a one-to-one basis.

Prem also shared with me how Care2Run designs the sporting activities in which the 20 youth participate in – a form of sports Care2Run calls “developmental sports”.

“Developmental sports are sports that recognize individual learning needs. We do not compete with each other, we compete with ourselves to do better. For example, we have combined the traditional hopscotch with an exercise ladder and developmental education as a way to teach them numbers,” said Prem

“Our hypothesis is that developmental sports can help young people with learning challenges to be more active, and enhance quality of life and cognitive functions,” he added.

I then spoke to Care2Run volunteer Gregory Phua, who helps design Care2Run’s sporting activities to get a better understanding of what goes into creating them.

“They might be on the autism spectrum and live with dyslexia at the same time, and this compounds the challenges for them. As such, I design the activities to help bring about specific behavioural actions. For example, some children are driven by sight and touch and we need to take this into account,” he said.

Phua also said that there is a need to ensure that change happens on an intellectual level with the activities.

“All the exercises and activities have to incorporate safety, a learning experience and the activities need to be visually connected for children so they can identify it and participate right away. We need to be clear and precise as possible,” he said.

Phua basically said that the aim of all of Care2Run’s initiatives is to give the youth with us the skills to lead at least a semi-independent life as they move into adulthood, adding that these concepts and skills were woven into the games he designed.

He also shared with me why Care2Run’s activities take place outdoors.

“If you put people behind four walls, you don’t get a natural environment. When you get a natural environment, you begin to see how they interact with other people,” he said.

It was at this point I asked Prem how the public could help Care2Run with their efforts, and he said that there are three ways people can help – the first being by helping the organization with research it is doing on developmental sport.

“We would love to get 20 high-functioning youth who have Down Syndrome or autism to help with our research on the efficacy of our programme. Currently Care2Run has 10 high-functioning participants along with 10 who are moderate to low-functioning. We need 10 more high-functioning students,” he said.

Prem also said that Care2Run also needs mentors.

“As youths join us we will need more mentors, and we would welcome 20 highly-energetic mentors to come and assist us on a three-week basis,” he said.

Prem also said that Care2Run needs financial help to run.

“We need about RM20,000 to operate every month to build and store learning aids and to have several employees so we can run these activities on a consistent high-quality basis,” he said.

And if you’re questioning why you should help Care2Run, this is what Prem had to say:

“We are doing something novel – developmental sports – to help enhance the cognitive functioning of these young individuals and their quality of life. We help them gain a measure of independence as their cognitive function improves.”

ON June 18, 2016, seven-year-old K. Durgasini passed away. Her cause of death? Bacterial diphtheria.

Then on June 22, a two-year-old boy from Kuala Muda was admitted to Sultan Abdul Halim Hospital along with six siblings for suspected diphtheria.

Of the seven siblings, four children were not immunised against diphtheria – including the deceased two-year-old.

Back then, I had a glimmer of hope that these would be the last cases of preventable diphtheria I’d see.

However, this was not to be as a two-year-old child from Johor Baru who was not immunised passed away on Feb 21 this year, and the child’s death was due to diptheria.

Since then, the Health Ministry has said that misinformation about vaccination had led to a huge jump in the number of vaccine-preventable diseases, with cases of measles jumping over 10-fold from 2013 to  last year.

It also said that a lack of immunisation was detected last year in all six measles deaths recorded and in 19 of the 22 deaths from whooping cough (pertussis).

So yes, after reading all this, you’re going to hear me say the same thing I said in June 2016 – that parents need to immunise their children to prevent utterly avoidable tragedies like this.

And once again, I’m going to urge you to do more than just take my word for it and listen to experts like paediatrician and neonatologist Datuk Dr Musa Nordin, especially if you’ve yet to keep your kids up to date on their vaccinations because of doubts about vaccines.

On the issue of vaccines causing autism – especially the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine – Dr Musa said in a TV Al-Hijrah talk show that no study has been able to replicate what was claimed by Andrew Wakefield linking the vaccine to autism

“Autism is a disorder that is strongly linked to genetics. In the case of identical twins, if one has autism the chance that the other twin is also autistic is as high as 90% because they share the same genetic material. There is no relation whatsoever with the mercury or aluminium used in vaccines,” added Dr Musa.

At this point I’ll just put in my own thoughts and ask parents who refuse to vaccinate their kids because of these fears if they think that autism is so bad that they’ll rather their kids be dead than autistic?

Now, returning to Dr Musa, he also shared his observations about the anti-vaccine information online.

“In the hierarchy of information, right at the top are randomised control studies and at the bottom are testimonials, or anecdotal evidence. Much of the anti-vaccine information online is anecdotal and we cannot use this because the evidence is insufficient,” said Dr Musa

Additionally, he urged people to be careful when going online to look for information on vaccines

” If you google ‘vaccines’, 60% of what you’ll find are anti-vaccine websites and many of them go on excessively about adverse effects following immunisation. That is why the World Health Organisation and Unicef have come out with a website with information,” said Dr Musa.

He added that the website is called the Vaccine Safety Net Project at https://www.vaccinesafetynet.org/ and said that it addresses any information about adverse effects.

Dr Musa then spoke of another critical reason why people should be vaccinated, and that is to prevent the spread of diseases that would otherwise be contained if people were vaccinated.

“In 2015, an unvaccinated child went to Disneyland and caught the measles. It then spread to 20 states, north to Canada and south to Mexico. In Malaysia, we had 195 cases in 2013. In 2018, we had over 1,900 cases,” he said.

This is also something touched on by the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom, which also put forward an argument in favour of vaccination through their Vaccine Knowledge Project.

“For example, if someone with measles is surrounded by people who are vaccinated against measles, the disease cannot easily be passed on to anyone, and it will quickly disappear again. This is called ‘herd immunity’ or ‘community immunity’, and it gives protection to vulnerable people such as newborn babies, elderly people and those who are too sick to be vaccinated,” said the Project.

So yes, I am completely for vaccinations and I am totally in support of any proposal to make immunisation mandatory.

As it stands, there have been too many preventable deaths already and Malaysians need to step up, heed the evidence-based science and do something before it’s too late.

PETALING JAYA: Mandatory laws are not the best way to ensure that parents vaccinate their children, says Unicef Malaysia representative Marianne Clark-Hattingh.

“The government of Malaysia is right in giving importance to vaccination of all children. However, mandatory laws are not the best way to do this.

“Unicef’s experience shows that there is little evidence to show that mandatory laws improve vaccination coverage,” she said in a statement issued Friday (March 1).

Clark-Hattingh’s remarks came a day after the Health Ministry formed a task force to study proposals and calls to make vaccination compulsory.

According to Clark-Hattingh, there are better and more effective approaches to foster and sustain demands for immunisation.

She said it was crucial to understand why parents were reluctant to vaccinate and subsequently guide the parents with the right information and targeted campaigns.

“There is also a need to constantly engage healthcare providers for improved communication with clients,” she added.

Clark-Hattingh expressed concern over the re-emergence of measles and diphtheria, and the escalating number of parents who are reluctant to vaccinate their children.

“No child should be blamed for not being vaccinated. Preventing an unvaccinated child from going to school is a violation of their right to access education.”

She said that the government must consider the consequences of not allowing unvaccinated children to school on their overall well-being.

“Vaccinating every child is critical. Not vaccinating your child puts others at risk,” she added.

Clark-Hattingh said a child’s best interest is protected when parents and caregivers vaccinate them based on informed decisions or are prompted by non-coercive measures and interventions.

She also said that health workers at both public and private facilities should continue their efforts to ensure that every child is vaccinated.