HEALTH D-G: PEOPLE LESS VIGILANT SINCE ROLLOUT OF NIP
61,984 new cases and 235 deaths recorded in four weeks, says Dr Noor Hisham
HEALTH director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said pandemic fatigue has begun to set in, as people have become less vigilant since the rollout of the National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme (NIP).
This was reflected in the rise of new daily cases and the increasing death toll since the beginning of last month.
“Malaysia has recorded 61,984 new cases and 235 fatalities in four weeks.
“The spike in new infections and fatalities has increased the burden on the healthcare sector.
“Consequently, the capacity of hospitals has been increased and more healthcare personnel have been mobilised to outbreak areas to sustain the rise in the number of patients,” he said yesterday.
Dr Noor Hisham said genome surveillance by the Institute of Medical Research had found three variants of concern (VOC): B.1.351, B.1.1.7 and the B.1.1.28 variants, and one variant of interest, which is the B.1.617.1 variant.
“International border control has also been tightened to restrict the entry of travellers from India.
“The quarantine period for travellers from countries that have encountered the local transmission of VOC has been raised to 14 days.
“Border control in districts and states has been tightened through nationwide roadblocks.
“The capacity of hospitals and Intensive Care Units has been increased, the second phase of the NIP will be implemented and enforcement of SOP compliance has been stepped up with the help of several agencies.
“We have empowered the community to face the Covid19 threat through ABC-19 (Covid19 Eradicating Agent programme).”
He said the ministry had launched the Hotspots Identification for Dynamic Engagement in collaboration with Bank Negara to devise a targeted intervention strategy based on the prediction of hotspots nationwide.
Yesterday, Malaysia reported 2,500 new infections and 18 deaths, bringing the cumulative number of cases to 417,512 and the death toll to 1,551.
There were 352 patients in ICU and 186 patients requiring breathing assistance.
Selangor continued to lead with 637 cases, followed by Sarawak (356 cases), Johor (205 cases), Kuala Lumpur (200 cases) and Penang (194 cases).
Four of the new cases were imported, while the rest (2,496 cases) were local transmissions.
Perlis and Labuan did not report new infections.
The Health Ministry detected nine new clusters. Three were community clusters, two linked to educational institutions, three linked to workplaces and one linked to a detention centre.
The community clusters were the Lorong Galing cluster in Pahang (13 cases), Jalan Dahlia Lima cluster in Melaka (11 cases) and Bunga Raya cluster in Kedah (10 cases).
The workplace clusters were the Industri Mahkota 2 cluster in Selangor (121 cases), Jalan Jati Industri cluster in Johor (26 cases) and Tok Has cluster (29 cases).
The clusters linked to educational institutions were the Jalan Bandar cluster in Johor Baru (18 cases) and the Indera MahkotaDua cluster in Kuantan (16 cases), while the Jalan Meru Utama detention centre cluster had 40 cases.
Dr Noor Hisham said seven clusters had ended: Kalindukan, Merinding, Tanjung Genting, Bunga Tanjung Bendahara, DTI Jalan Duta, Jalan Dahlia 22 and Taman Komersial clusters.