UCS AVIATION
C O V I D -1 9 & THE AIR AMBUL ANCE BOOM 54
If there was a moment when the burgeoning air ambulance market came into its own, it was following the arrival of Covid-19.
Even before the pandemic, demand for air ambulances was expected to grow – but the introduction of travel restrictions between countries changed the game overnight. For insight into how this happened, take the story of Abdul Rashid Sahari (64) and his wife Safiah (56). For 20 years, Sahari had been working in Jakarta in Indonesia as a quality control officer for a power plant, according to The Straits Times. But the couple wanted to celebrate their 33rd wedding anniversary in their home country, Singapore, along with their daughter and three grandchildren. A fancy dinner was planned, travel arrangements were made, and the family was gleefully anticipating the reunion. Then Rashid and Safiah both caught Covid. While Safiah’s condition soon stabilised, Rashid’s went downhill fast, and he was eventually admitted to a private hospital in Jakarta on December 3rd. “What started with him still fighting through and smiling for the family in video calls became video calls of him struggling to breathe,” said his son-in-law Haikel Fahim. The family realised they had to get him back home “to give him a better fighting chance”. But with commercial air travel impossible for the seriously ill Rashid, the family realised an emergency air evacuation was the only option.
