The Minister of Health, Eng. Khalid Al-Falih reiterated that a quick probe is ordered into Mina's deadly stampede, which took place today due to a possible violation - on the part of pilgrims- of the flocking plans developed by the concerned authorities. Results of the probe will be communicated to the public as usual. The security sector and the whole government in general adopt transparency and truthfulness– praise be to Allah- in sharing the facts with the nation in KSA and the whole Islamic world. The Minister noted that all sectors are harnessing their capabilities to handle the incident the best they could, acknowledging, "The crush incident was grave and tragic for all of us as Muslims," he said.
In his statement to the media, Al-Falih indicated that there is no conclusive record of the number of victims so far. However, the Civil Defense General Directorate reported an initial number of victims and will report the final number after recording a complete count of the victims. "Aside from the victims' number, our top concern now is saving the injured and providing them with the required healthcare services," said the Minister.
Al-Falih added, "Since the state of emergency was declared at 9 am, we have been working at full capacity in all of MOH facilities. We mobilized all of our medical crews, including night-shifters, and transferred some of the medical staff, who were working all day yesterday, from Arafat to Mina. Injured cases have been transferred to the Holy Sites' hospitals; we will transfer more cases to Makkah, Jeddah, and Tai'f as required".