Singapore's front-line response to a disease outbreak is probably one of the last things any male citizen expects to be involved in during his full-time national service.
It certainly did not cross Corporal Muhammad Arfan Mohammad Shahrom's mind when he was posted to the Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) over a year ago.
But on Jan 23 at about 10am, the 21-year-old medic, along with two others in his ambulance team, rushed to pick up a Chinese national who was said to be running a fever and having a cough.
The man was taken to Tan Tock Seng Hospital, and was later confirmed to have Covid-19, the coronavirus disease.
Cpl Arfan told The Straits Times that he was slightly worried when he attended to the case.
"But I had the proper training, and I also trusted in my crew. Knowing that they had my back gave me confidence."
The two others in his crew were both experienced warrant officers - First Warrant Officer (1WO) Ian Ang Wei Lee and Second Warrant Officer (2WO) Zulkifli Arsarapi - who between them have more than three decades of service in the SCDF.
The incident is just one of the many suspected cases of the coronavirus that the three men have attended to since then.
By Feb 12, just three weeks after the first case, SCDF had responded to more than 200 calls on suspected cases of Covid-19.
Both 1WO Ang and 2WO Zulkifli said they were not anxious about the risks of attending to potential Covid-19 patients.
"Such concerns didn't cross my mind. We are trained to be prepared for these situations, and were more focused on what was at hand," said 1WO Ang, 34.
Like clockwork, they donned their full protective equipment - masks, gowns, gloves and shoe covers - and reached the person within minutes, as with any other case.
The gear and equipment attracted the attention of the public during the initial weeks of the outbreak, said 2WO Zulkifli, 42.
But this subsided, he added, after Senior Parliamentary Secretary for Health and Home Affairs Amrin Amin made clear earlier this month that paramedics have worn the gear when responding to all types of medical emergencies - and not just Covid-19 cases - since Feb 7, when the disease outbreak response was raised to orange, which means the outbreak has a moderate to high public health impact.
In fact, knowing that they are taking precautions such as wearing protective gear has helped reassure their families.
Cpl Arfan, who has a twin brother serving NS in the police force, said that his parents were worried at first because of news reports on how serious the outbreak seemed to be getting.
But the stringent decontamination routines for equipment and precautions such as minimising contact and showering and changing before heading home have helped calm them.
Similarly, 2WO Zulkifli said his wife is not worried at all. "She knows what I do, she is used to it, and knows that we are trained to do this," the father of two said.
The three officers hope the outbreak will be over soon and things can go back to normal. Said 1WO Ang: "Eventually this will pass, we just need to hang on for now. If each of us can play our roles, we will tide over this pretty fast."
