Malaysia-based digital therapeutics company Naluri partners with Malaysia Aviation Group to provide psychological wellbeing support

KLIA, 28 August 2020: Naluri, a Malaysia-based digital therapeutics company, has announced a partnership with Malaysia Aviation Group (MAG) to provide their employees with psychological health support amidst the pandemic. MAG is a global aviation organisation, which consists of national carrier Malaysia Airlines, Firefly, MASwings, MABkargo, MAB Academy, and AeroDarat among others.

With this partnership, Naluri will offer all MAG employees therapeutic care that combines behaviour science, data science, and digital design. Their digital therapeutics programme will implement a multi-disciplinary and structured approach to health coaching and psychological support with quantifiable health outcomes.

Buffering the impact of COVID-19 on employees in the aviation sector

The demand for air travel continues to be severely impacted by COVID-19. The International Air Transport Association (IATA) released an updated global passenger forecast showing that Global passenger traffic (revenue passenger kilometers or RPKs) will not return to pre-COVID-19 levels until 2024. The report highlighted that Asia-Pacific airlines’ June traffic plummeted 97.1% compared to the year-ago period, little improved from the 98.1% decline in May. Capacity fell 93.4% and load factor shrank 45.8 percentage points to 35.6%.

Due to the 80-94% flight capacity cuts between April to August which have caused a major loss in passenger revenue, MAG had to take hard measures to aggressively defend their cash position including capacity and resource management by deferring non-critical spend and implementing cost-cutting initiatives across the businesses. Earlier this year, MAG offered its employees the option of taking three months of unpaid leave or five days of unpaid leave per month for a period of three months beginning in April 2020. These measures were undertaken to prevent the possibility of employee layoffs to cut costs. By deploying a digital therapeutics programme, MAG seeks to buffer the impact of uncertainty and anxiety surrounding COVID-19 on their employees so as to protect their mental well-being.

MAG Chief Executive Officer Captain Izham Ismail said, “MAG launched our own Employee Assistance Programme (EAP) in March 2020 to provide employees in Malaysia and at international stations with continuous communications and engagement to help them cope with the challenges of being in lockdown and working from home. This includes access to financial counselling and financial literacy courses besides constant tips to adapt to the new norm, providing our employees with the much-needed support to ensure their well-being. We further enhanced the EAP with the MHeart – Healthy Mind, Healthy Body psychological well-being digital platform in July 2020. With this partnership, we can draw upon Naluri’s digital platform and technologies to provide them with proactive support rather than reactive. We understand the importance of mental well-being and believe that early screening is important so intervention can be timely, and Naluri can help us do exactly that.”

Mental health issues cost Malaysia approximately RM14 billion

Prior to the COVID-19 crisis, it was estimated that mental health issues among employees were to cost the country roughly RM14.46 billion or 1% of Malaysia’s GDP. This figure is expected to be higher now given the psychological toll of the pandemic and its associated measures. During this unprecedented time of uncertainty and fear, it is likely that existing mental health issues will be exacerbated. In addition, epidemics have shown to induce general stress, anxiety, and depression.

However, the stigma around mental health is still prevalent in Malaysia. For the few companies that do offer mental health services as part of an employee assistance programme, solutions tend to be costly and unsustainable with significantly low rates of employees reaching for help. There needs to be a greater clarion call for employers to better address mental health issues in the workplace, especially during a precarious time as now.

“Malaysia Airlines is the national carrier and the pride of the nation, and we are happy to support them during this trying time. We are proud of them for setting this example for employers in the tourism, aviation and hospitality industries— sectors that have been the worst affected by this pandemic. Mental health is key to a company’s and a country’s overall growth and Naluri has the resources, tools, and expertise to help,” shared Azran Osman Rani, CEO, and co-founder of Naluri.

“Our internal data and multiple studies by the Ministry of Health show that 30–50% of working adults experience mental health pressures. While traditional EAP models are there to help, unfortunately, with these programs only 2%-4% of the employees are reaching out for help. This is why we believe companies need a more comprehensive health solution to support our workforce, especially during these challenging times,” Azran said.

“Hence this is where Naluri steps in. With our integrated and holistic health approach that combines mental health and physical health, led by a behavioural psychologist as a health coach, we can deliver quantifiable improvements in employee health that are clinically-significant,” said Azran.

“This approach not only provides the much-needed support to employees but also brings value to the business in the long run in the form of improved productivity,” he concluded.

Naluri disrupts EAP with early screening. A typical distribution of employees would see 40% having depression, 60% experiencing anxiety, and 30% dealing with stress. Currently, Naluri has about 50 experts on their platform, and their expertise range from psychologists to fitness coaches to dieticians. Apart from MAG, Naluri is also implementing digital therapeutics solutions for other notable companies such as Petronas, AHA Insurance, Pfizer, and RHB Bank. They have about 13,000 users on their app across Malaysia, Singapore, and Indonesia.