New cluster emerges at Semenyih detention centre

PUTRAJAYA: A new Covid-19 cluster has emerged with 21 cases detected at the Immigration’s Semenyih detention centre.

The Health Ministry said it would investigate the source of the Covid19 outbreak at both the Semenyih and Bukit Jalil Immigration detention centres.

Health director-general Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said they were looking into whether the staff members of the detention centres were the source of the disease.

‘The detainees are not going anywhere, but the staff members are going in and out,” he said at the ministry’s daily Covid-19 press briefing yesterday.

A total of 35 cases were detected at the Bukit Jalil centre on Friday.

Dr Noor Hisham said 114 staff members from the Bukit Jalil centre and 121 from Semenyih had been tested for Covid-19 and all the results had been negative.

He said detainees who tested positive had been moved out while their close contacts had been isolated from the rest.

Dr Noor Hisham said there was a possibility that one or two of the detainees were not screened or the virus was not detected during the incubation period.

The detainees, all from the enhanced movement control order (MCO) areas, were screened on Day 1 and Day 13 of their quarantine, before being detained by the Immigration.

He noted that only those who tested negative after undergoing screening were placed at the detention centres.

Dr Noor Hisham said precautionary measures were being taken at detention centres and prisons.

Malaysia reported 48 Covid-19 cases yesterday, bringing the country’s total infections to 7,185.

Out of the 48 new cases, four were imported cases while the others were local transmissions.

Dr Noor Hisham also said 53 more patients had been discharged, which means 5,912 patients have recovered from Covid-19 in Malaysia since the outbreak began.

Malaysia’s Covid-19 recovery rate is now at 82.3% out of the total number of positive cases.

There are 1,158 active cases being treated at the country’s health facilities at present.

There were no new deaths recorded, with the country’s death toll at 115.