The MOH’s Health Volunteer Center has announced that its volunteer services (including health care, awareness, and education) have reached 3.5 million beneficiaries in various regions of the Kingdom. This came as a result of two months of intensive efforts to confront the novel Coronavirus pandemic, from March 1st to April 30th. A total of 8,335 male and female volunteers have completed over 340,000 volunteer hours. They included tasks and work in several areas, such as epidemiological investigation and community examination. Moreover, they worked at quarantines and health institutions, as well as offered medical consultations, home care, and delivery of medicines to patients at their homes. They have also done administrative work and offered logistical support for health professionals.
Noteworthy, the Health Volunteer Center has recently been established at MOH. It was part of the Community Participation Program’s initiatives within MOH’s National Transformation Program. The center aims to manage and regulate health volunteering. It also seeks to take part in developing volunteering legislations and regulations and laying the foundations for monitoring health volunteering at MOH.
For his part, Dr. Safar Saad Battar, the Executive Director of the Center, said that MOH's Health Volunteer Center has received over 157,000 volunteering requests during the past period through ‘Health Volunteer’ Platform. This platform was launched in implementation of a royal decree to form a committee to implement a volunteering plan. Its main aim is confronting COVID-19 by integrating several government agencies. “The recent achievement is only one of many, thanks to the efforts of these volunteers. They were quick to fulfill the country’s needs and worked with the government sector to preserve human health,” Battar said. He stressed that the center is keen on providing volunteer opportunities for registered health volunteers, according to the needs of different regions.