Student first aid teams enter the fray

JAKARTA (JP): Student-organized medical teams have taken on a crucial role in treating the injured from student protests and clashes with security personnel.

Amid a reluctance of official medical personnel to venture out into the danger of the violence, the student-organized teams and their makeshift convoys of vans-cum-ambulances provide first aid to victims hurt in the protests and transport casualties.

The first group established was the Emergency Medical Unit (UMRC), a team of paramedics organized by students from the School of Medicine of West Jakarta's Tarumanegara University last May.

"We were moved by the incident at the Semanggi cloverleaf in Central Jakarta in November last year," the coordinator of the round-the-clock emergency services office of UMRC, identified only as Budi, told The Jakarta Post on Friday.

"Paramedics from the Indonesian Red Cross panicked because they were not ready to handle so many victims during the incident.

"No ambulances from Cipto Mangunkusumo General Hospital were in sight even as the number of victims lying on the street continued to pile up."

At least five students died and dozens were injured when students clashed with troops after the end to the Special Session of the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR). Students protested the upholding of the appointment of B.J. Habibie to the presidency.

Students from the medical school felt they could do their part to help out wounded protesters.

"We thought of having a medical team of our own to help our friends," Budi said.

UMRC has 25 members and an ambulance which was lent by the university's medical school. The university also helps UMRC with its expenditures.

Being part of an emergency medical team does not mean that students are free from fear or can avoid being caught in the middle of clashes between security officers and the protesters.

"I was lost in the crowd during the clash in November last year. My friends thought that someone must have kidnapped me," a UMRC member, Relly, said.

"Two UMRC members were shot by rubber bullets during clashes between students and troops last month."

Like official members of the medical community, the students also pledge to help out all of those who are injured, be they students, members of the public or troops.

It created an unforgettable memory for Ichwan, another member of the team, after enraged supporters of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI Perjuangan) took to the streets on Oct. 20 after their leader Megawati Soekarnoputri's defeat in the presidential election.

"I was stitching up the wound of a soldier who had been hit by a rock when the PDI Perjuangan supporters started looking at me furiously. I was so scared they might take their anger out on me," he told the Post.

UMRC is better equipped than the Volunteers Team (KSR) at Atma Jaya University.

"We do not have an ambulance and sometimes the university administrators prohibit us from setting up a post inside the campus," Richard Nugraha, a KSR member, said.

"Our medicine supply is mostly donated by the public. The Indonesian Red Cross lends us the ambulance."

KSR experienced its first street activity in May last year during a protest on the campus of the Jakarta Teachers Training Institute (IKIP Jakarta) in East Jakarta, now the site of a university.

"That was the first time we dealt with victims of tear gas canisters," another member, Yustinus, said.

Both teams are now so well-known for their medical services that they are inundated with phone calls from various organizations the night before a planned protest.

"We don't just deal with students, but also labor protesters," Budi said. He said UMRC was on hand in Cibitung, West Java, when workers from the Mayora cookie factory held a strike earlier this year.

With street protests a rarity for the time being, the teams are devoting their services to other problems. For UMRC, it still involves taking to the streets.

"We how help the street children around our campus in Grogol, West Jakarta," Budi said.

"We have a 24-hour post to help the children with their problems." (04)