JEDDAH — The female wing of the Saudi Red Crescent Authority (SRCA) has started providing training on first aid and emergency services to Saudi women in Jeddah, according to a senior official from the authority. Dr. Muneera Al-Mazroui, director general of the wing, said the authority is introducing this service to Jeddah 20 years after it was launched in other major cities in the Kingdom. She attributed the delay to administrative reasons. Speaking to Al-Watan daily, Al-Mazroui said women were trained to carry out emergency services in Riyadh, Qassim, Asir and other regions except Makkah and Jeddah several years ago. “The authority opened the training center at SRCA's Jeddah headquarters, and the center will be instrumental in creating job opportunities for qualified women who are interested in working in this sector.” She said there are 10 trainers at the center. According to Al-Mazroui, these trainers will conduct programs on how to deal with emergency situations, especially road accidents and fire. As well as working as trainers for the Prince Naif First Aid Program, they will also train government schoolteachers. She noted that there are 50 trainers and 22 cadets working in the authority's female sections across the Kingdom. Disaster management The Civil Defense Department in the Eastern Province has completed training a number of women on how to handle tragedies and the best ways of extinguishing fires. Abdullah Al-Khoshman, director general of the department, said as many as 31 women employees from Dammam University as well as from departments of health, education and social affairs have benefited from the training program. The beneficiaries included supervisors and workers in security and safety, educational supervisors, doctors and nurses. According to Al-Khoshman, the program was based on three pivotal areas: safety, firefighting and civil protection. These included definition and goals of safety, warning systems, why fire incidents happen especially electricity related ones, types of fire incidents and ways of dealing with them, general causes of fires, use of fire extinguishers and water hoses, definition of civil protection, ways of evacuation, types of shelters and the ways of evacuating to these shelters. Meanwhile, Lt. Gen. Saad Al-Tuwaijri, director general of Civil Defense, said more than 70 percent of domestic fire incidents could be averted if smoke detectors and warning systems installed properly.
