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. Mental health issues cost Malaysia approximately RM14 billion.

With this partnership, Naluri will offer all MAG employees therapeutic care that combines behavior 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%. 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.”

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.