CORONAVIRUS | The special flight carrying Malaysian nationals from Wuhan, China, the epicentre of the 2019 novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV), arrived safely at Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) early today.

The AirAsia flight chartered specifically for the Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HADR) mission initiated by the Malaysian government landed at 5.57am.

A total of 107 individuals, comprising Malaysians and their non-Malaysian spouses and children, were brought home in the special flight which departed from Wuhan Tianhe International Airport.

Also on board were 12 crew members, eight HADR mission personnel and six officers from the Malaysian Embassy in Beijing.

The flight departed from the Kuala Lumpur International Airport 2 (klia2) for Wuhan at 3.50pm on Monday with 12 crew and eight HADR mission personnel.

The aircraft also brought with it 500,000 pairs of rubber gloves as a contribution to the Chinese government in an effort to contain the 2019-nCoV outbreak in the country.

Yesterday, Deputy Prime Minister Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail was reported as saying that all passengers on board the flight, on arrival in Malaysia, would have to undergo health screening at the Air Disaster Unit (ADU) at the KLIA.

Those detected with the symptoms will immediately be sent to hospital, while others will be taken by bus to a monitoring centre.

- Bernama