Illegals Are Human Too, Says Health Ministry

KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 30 (Bernama) -- Government hospitals will continue to provide treatment to foreign nationals, including illegal immigrants, on humanitarian grounds.
Health Ministry Parliamentary Secretary Datuk Lee Kah Choon said this was part of the ministry's duty which included ensuring that illegal immigrants were not the source of infectious diseases.
"At the Health Ministry, we adopt a humanitarian policy because when sick people come to our hospitals, we have to give treatment to them no matter if they are illegal or legal immigrants.
"Secondly, we have to treat immigrants with communicable diseases like malaria or cholera. Otherwise, they will become the source of outbreak of the diseases," he said in reply to Donald Peter Mojuntin (BN-Penampang) in the Dewan Rakyat Wednesday.
Lee said that 78,177 illegal immigrants or 4.4 per cent of the total number of patients received treatment in government hospitals in Sabah in 2004. Last year, the number was 77,114 or 4.8 per cent.
Three government hospitals in the state which treated the most foreign nationals were the Duchess of Kent Hospital (18,863), Tawau Hospital (14,558), and Lahad Datu Hospital (9,977).