RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Fire­fight­ers are of­ten ex­posed to se­ri­ous health risks in­clud­ing heat ex­haus­tion, burns, and phys­i­cal and men­tal stress.

That’s why the South West Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty set up a Men’s Well­ness Fair on the com­pound of the Di­vi­sion­al Fire Head­quar­ters, in Mon Re­pos, to of­fer a range of med­ical check­ups and screen­ing to fire­fight­ers and mem­bers of the pub­lic.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia, As­sis­tant Chief Fire Of­fi­cer Ansar Ali said there was a need to keep staff healthy and hap­py.

We are en­cour­ag­ing them to get med­ical check­ups, have prop­er nour­ish­ment, and do reg­u­lar sug­ar test­ing. This is all about en­sur­ing that our staff are healthy and strong,” he said.

With fire­fight­ers sub­ject­ed to smoke in­hala­tion and tox­ic fumes and gas­es, Ali said it was im­por­tant to do reg­u­lar screen­ing.

“We have trained pro­fes­sion­als who are ques­tion­ing, coun­selling and screen­ing for prostate,” he added.

While most po­lice sta­tions are out­fit­ted with gyms, Ali said this was not the case with all fire sta­tions.

“Some new­er sta­tions are out­fit­ted but old­er ones are not equipped with gyms. How­ev­er, we have peo­ple who pro­vide phys­i­cal train­ing for all fire­fight­ers so we have a sys­tem in place to keep us at a cer­tain lev­el,” he added.

He not­ed, how­ev­er, that keep­ing fit re­quired per­son­al ef­fort.

Mean­while, Sel­wyn Her­bert, act­ing sub-of­fi­cer at Mon Re­pos Fire Head­quar­ters said he ex­pect­ed be­tween 200-300 peo­ple will ben­e­fit from the med­ical fair.