BANGKOK: Kabinet Thailand meluluskan projek alam sekitar bersama Malaysia yang bertujuan mengurangkan risiko banjir, meningkatkan keselamatan air dan memulihkan ekosistem di Lembangan Sungai Golok, iaitu laluan air merentas sempadan utama yang menghubungkan kedua-dua negara.

Inisiatif yang mendapat sokongan dana sebanyak US$4 juta (RM15.9 juta) daripada Kemudahan Alam Sekitar Global (GEF) itu akan dilaksana dalam tempoh 48 bulan dengan sokongan Pertubuhan Makanan dan Pertanian Pertubuhan Bangsa-Bangsa Bersatu (FAO).

Timbalan Jurucakap Kerajaan Thailand, Lalida Persvivatana, berkata projek itu dibangunkan secara bersama oleh Pejabat Sumber Air Kebangsaan Thailand dan Jabatan Pengairan dan Saliran (JPS) Malaysia untuk menambah baik pengurusan banjir, menangani hakisan tebing sungai serta memperkukuh pengurusan sumber air merentas sempadan di Lembangan Sungai Golok.

"Projek ini mencerminkan komitmen kedua-dua negara dalam memperkukuh keselamatan alam sekitar dan memastikan pengurusan mampan bagi sumber air yang dikongsi bersama," katanya dalam satu kenyataan selepas mesyuarat Kabinet, semalam.

Lalida berkata, inisiatif berkenaan akan meningkatkan kerjasama dua hala melalui pembangunan pangkalan data bersama, penilaian risiko banjir dan kemarau, serta pelan tindakan strategik bersama untuk lembangan sungai itu.

"Ia juga akan mempromosikan penyelesaian berasaskan alam semula jadi bagi memulihkan ekosistem dan mengurangkan kesan cabaran alam sekitar terhadap komuniti di dalam lembangan berkenaan," katanya.

Sungai Golok membentuk sebahagian daripada sempadan semula jadi antara selatan Thailand dan utara Semenanjung Malaysia, dan sering terkesan oleh banjir bermusim yang menjejaskan komuniti di kedua-dua belah sempadan.

– BERNAMA

Parents wade through flooded access roads to ferry their children to school, and teachers step into knee-deep water to guide children over benches that serve as a bridge over submerged corridors.

Students and staff at the 82-year-old institution, which has an enrollment of 141 in eight classes, have endured floods 10 to 20 times a year since 2014.

Despite the challenges they have been facing, the Klang district education office continued to reject their application to move from its current location in Kampung Teluk Gong — until February 2025 when it was finally approved.

A 2ha site in Bandar Bestari, located 4.18km away, has been gazetted, with construction slated to begin in June.  

However, there is a problem — there is not enough money to underwrite the cost of building a new school.

From village to industrial fringe

School board chairman Yeo Jue Chuan, an alumnus from the 1970s, said the school was once central to village life.

“Generations of my family studied here. But by the 1980s, factories began to encroach into the village, bringing pollution, heavy traffic, and frequent accidents,” told FMT.

During a visit, FMT observed long lines of lorries along the school’s only access road.

The narrow stretch is riddled with potholes, likely worn out by the constant pounding on the tarmac by heavy trucks moving in and out of the surrounding factories.

In fact, it was the traffic problem and the resulting pollution that prompted the school board to start its effort to relocate the school in 2013, a year before the frequent floods began.

Senior assistant for student affairs Tang Mee Lin said when floods happen overnight, parents are notified and reminded to send their children to school in boots.

“In December last year, the water rose so high that teachers and parents couldn’t enter the school compound, so lessons had to be conducted on Google Meet,” she said.

Even during exam weeks, students had to cross flooded corridors on a makeshift bridge of benches to reach the hall and toilets.

“Sometimes, teachers even take turns carrying children from their parents’ cars and bikes into the compound,” Tang said.

With just a small cleaning staff, teachers and school board members have to lend a hand in cleaning up the classrooms before the first lesson of the day.

“But what’s most exhausting is when it rains again the next night. Each time, worms crawl up the walls and into classrooms,” Tang added.

Math teacher Lee Lay Chen said heavy rain and floods during lessons leave her students visibly distracted.

“They worry about whether or not their homes are flooded, since the surrounding area is low and water rises quickly. As a result, they can’t pay attention in class,” she said.

Tang said the disruptions have forced teachers to adjust lesson plans to minimise the impact on students’ learning.

“We always try different teaching approaches to ensure students’ academic performance is not affected, even in situations like this,” she said.

Relocation hurdles, funding gap

Relocation committee chairman Jason Lee said the district education office had turned down the school’s request for relocation three times since the efforts began in 2013. He said the officials had argued that issues such as traffic and floods were “manageable”.

But the Selangor irrigation department turned things around for the school. A survey it conducted in December 2023 showed that the school sat nearly a foot below the road level, and it was beyond the capacity of the drainage system to prevent frequent floods.

Armed with the report, the board resubmitted its application for relocation to the education ministry in early 2024. The Bandar Bestari site was gazetted in October 2024, while full approval followed in February 2025.

But relocating the school comes at a steep price. The new campus is expected to cost RM30 million, and because the land now belongs to the government, the board has no assets to sell.

Since May 2025, the school has raised RM13.5 million through more than 200 fundraising drives and donations, largely from Chinese associations and temple events. Still, a RM16.5 million shortfall remains.

“More than 80% of Klang’s Chinese community already know about our relocation effort, and many ask why we don’t just get government support. We’ve tried everything we can on our own,” Jason Lee said.

The board is now appealing to federal and state authorities and corporations for special funding. Without it, he warned, the targeted 2028 opening could slip to 2029 or beyond.

“Right now, every time there is a downpour in the night, we are left in fear of another round of flooding, and that problem can only be solved by relocating,” he said.

FMT has reached out to the Klang district education office for comment.

NEWS of the recent Andes virus (ANDV) outbreak aboard the cruise ship MV Hondius has understandably triggered concern among many people. Reports of multiple deaths, combined with social media discussions about passengers returning to their home countries after leaving the vessel, have revived memories many hoped had been left behind after the Covid-19 pandemic.

The reaction is understandable. Covid-19 changed the way societies respond to news about infectious diseases. For many people, any report involving an unfamiliar virus, overseas outbreaks, or international travel now immediately raises the same unsettling question: Could this become another global pandemic?

However, from a virology and public health perspective, not every virus behaves the same way, and not every outbreak carries the same pandemic potential.

That distinction matters.

The Andes virus belongs to the hantavirus family, a group of viruses typically associated with rodents as their natural hosts. Unlike SARS-CoV-2, which spreads very efficiently through respiratory droplets and aerosols in everyday public settings, the Andes virus has a much more limited transmission pattern. It depends heavily on a specific rodent species found mainly in parts of South America to persist in nature.

In virology, this ecological dependence is important because it places natural limits on how far and how easily the virus can spread geographically.

This is one of the key scientific differences often overlooked when people compare every new outbreak to Covid-19.

The Andes virus is unusual among hantaviruses because human-to-human transmission has been documented previously. However, available evidence suggests that such transmission is relatively rare and usually involves prolonged close contact, often within households or among family members. It does not spread with the same efficiency seen during the early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic, when even brief encounters in enclosed spaces or public transport could lead to widespread transmission.

Put simply, the Andes virus does not possess the same biological “engine” for rapid community spread.

Another important difference lies in its genetic behaviour. One of the major challenges during the Covid-19 pandemic was the rapid evolution of the coronavirus through mutations, producing successive variants within relatively short periods. Hantaviruses, including the Andes virus, are generally more genetically stable.

From a public health standpoint, this is reassuring because it allows scientists and health authorities to predict viral behaviour more reliably and maintain the effectiveness of existing diagnostic tools for longer periods.

This does not mean the virus should be dismissed lightly.

Individuals infected with the Andes virus can develop Hantavirus Pulmonary Syndrome (HPS), a serious illness affecting the lungs and cardiovascular system. Early symptoms often resemble common viral infections, including fever, muscle aches, headaches, and fatigue, before progressing in some cases to breathing difficulties and severe respiratory complications.

However, there is an important difference between a virus capable of causing severe illness in individuals and one capable of overwhelming healthcare systems through explosive transmission.

Covid-19 became a global crisis not only because it could cause death, but because it spread extraordinarily quickly across populations. Hospitals around the world faced sudden surges of patients within short periods, placing healthcare systems under immense strain. At present, there is no strong evidence suggesting the Andes virus has the same capacity for widespread, uncontrolled transmission.

Ecology also matters more than many people realise.

The rodent species most closely associated with the Andes virus does not exist in Malaysia. This significantly reduces the likelihood of natural transmission occurring locally. In infectious disease science, understanding the relationship between a virus and its natural host is often just as important as monitoring the number of reported cases.

For this reason, current risk assessments by organisations such as the World Health Organisation and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which continue to classify the global threat level as low, remain consistent with the available scientific evidence.

Perhaps the more important lesson from situations like this is not about fear, but perspective.

The Covid-19 pandemic taught societies to take infectious diseases seriously, and that awareness remains valuable. However, it also left many people emotionally conditioned to interpret every new outbreak through the lens of 2020. In reality, viruses differ greatly in how they spread, mutate, and sustain themselves within populations.

Public awareness is important. Panic is not.

As global disease surveillance becomes more advanced, reports of emerging viruses will likely become more common — not necessarily because the world is becoming more dangerous, but because we are now far better at detecting and monitoring outbreaks than before.

Understanding these differences calmly and scientifically may be one of the most important lessons we carry forward from the pandemic years. – May 25, 2026

Dr Muhammad Amir Yunus is a molecular virologist at PKTAAB, Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM), and may be reached at Alamat emel ini dilindungi dari Spambot. Anda perlu hidupkan JavaScript untuk melihatnya..

GUA MUSANG – Seorang ibu tunggal berdepan detik cemas apabila anak sungai di depan rumahnya naik mendadak ekoran hujan lebat dalam tempoh kira-kira 30 minit sebelum membanjiri rumahnya di Program Penempatan Masyarakat Setempat (PPMS) Tanah Putih di sini kelmarin.

Dalam kejadian kira-kira pukul 8.30 malam itu, Hayati Yahya, 43, berkata, dia tidak sempat menyelamatkan kebanyakan peralatan elektrik kerana tidak menyangka hujan lebat bertukar menjadi banjir kilat.

“Semuanya berlaku terlalu cepat. Ketika itu, air dalam rumah sudah separas betis dan banyak barang elektrik tidak dapat diselamatkan. Air mula surut kira-kira satu jam kemudian apabila hujan semakin reda kira-kira pukul 9.30 malam,” katanya.

Hayati memberitahu, kejadian itu merupakan kali kedua menimpa keluarganya sejak menetap di kawasan berkenaan sembilan tahun lalu bersama ibu dan dua anak.

“Walaupun sedih dan kecewa, saya reda kerana menganggap ini satu ujian menjelang Hari Raya Aidiladha. Selepas air mulai surut sekitar pukul 10 malam, saya bersama anak dan ahli keluarga lain terus membersihkan rumah.

“Saya terpaksa tutup kedai hari ini (semalam) kerana perlu mencuci rumah dan kemas barang yang ditenggelami banjir kilat. Selain rumah saya, tiga lagi rumah berhampiran turut terjejas akibat banjir kilat berkenaan,” katanya.

Sementara itu, Ketua Polis Daerah Gua Musang, Superintendan Sik Choon Foo berkata, beberapa jalan utama di daerah itu terpaksa ditutup sementara susulan hujan lebat dan limpahan air malam kelmarin. – KOSMO! ONLINE