Wife of shipping agent tests positive

The wife of a shipping company agent who is Covid19 Patient 9,332 under the MV Glen cluster has also contracted the virus, the Health Ministry confirmed.

Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said the 39-year-old woman tested positive for Covid-19 and was classified as a second-generation case under the cluster.

Following that, the MV Glen cluster which was detected in Port Klang now has three confirmed cases and as of yesterday, 58 individuals linked to the cluster had been screened.

Of that total, 16 have tested negative while 39 others are still waiting for their results. The index case (Patient 9,286) of the cluster is a ship crew member who was declared positive for the virus on Aug 25.

Dr Noor Hisham said the ministry and the Marine Department had taken numerous steps to monitor and strengthen the country’s maritime borders.

“This included the process of switching ship crew members beginning from the sign-on and sign-off at vessels as well as the mandatory quarantine order.

“The sign-on and sign-off health screening is important as this is one of the international border controls that is carried out to prevent the transmission of Covid-19 into our country from overseas.

“Many standard operating procedures and guidelines have been developed for those in the marine line who are entering Malaysia from abroad.

“This process will continue to be monitored and enhanced from time to time to ensure the smoothness of its execution,” he said.

The MV Glen case is one of two local transmission cases recorded by Malaysia yesterday out of the six new cases.

The other local transmission case was detected in Pahang from a screening conducted at a workplace. The patient was asymptomatic and was admitted to Hospital Tengku Ampuan Afzan in Kuantan.

The four imported cases involved foreigners who entered the country from Indonesia (three cases) and Syria (one).