MINA, 20 January 2005 — While pilgrims perform the Haj, hundreds of Saudi Boy Scouts are performing good deeds within the Haj health care network. Dr. Ali ibn Dhafir Al-Kahtani, the dean of Riyadh Health Sciences College and the head of Health Ministry’s Haj student recruitment committee, told Arab News that the ministry recruited 280 scouts to serve at its different health care facilities set up for Haj.
“Recruiting them has become a common practice at the ministry every year,” he said. “We are doing it with the cooperation with the Saudi Boy Scout Association. The aim out of this is manifold. At the top comes serving the guest of God. They also carry out routine tasks to save the time of the health care staff for more specialized jobs,” he said.
It might even give the boys some career ideas. “Another aim of their recruitment is to familiarize them with the working environment of health care facilities. This might result in them studying for health care professions when they get to college. You know that we still have shortages in the national staff at our health care facilities,” said Kahtani.
These boy scouts are already distributed in different health care facilities around the holy places in Mina, Arafat, and Muzdalifa in addition to Makkah. “What they do includes escorting discharged or stranded ill pilgrims following treatment to their accommodations, giving directions to pilgrim patients inside hospitals and health care centers, maintaining discipline in the waiting areas and queuing them up in front of the clinics,” Kahtani said.
Are they doing their good deeds for that day? “Indeed they are very useful, and we like to have them with us,” Kahtani added.
