Friday 29 Mar 2024
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This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily on April 20, 2020

KUALA LUMPUR: A new cluster of infections has been detected among Malaysian students returning from Temboro, which has been declared a Covid-19 red zone in the district of Magetan, Indonesia.

So far, the cluster comprises 43 people who were found positive on their return last Thursday; 34 of them have been quarantined in Melaka, while nine have been isolated in Kuala Lumpur and Putrajaya.

“There are several cases that are awaiting their test results,” said Health director-general Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah.

With the addition of these 43 cases, Malaysia now has a total of 48 imported cases, making up 57% of the 84 new infections the ministry detected as at noon yesterday. Of the five other imported cases are one from Kalimantan, three from Aceh, and one from Turkey, said Noor Hisham.

With the 84 new cases yesterday, Malaysia now has a total of 5,389 cases.

Meanwhile, Noor Hisham also updated that for the Seri Petaling cluster, 26,522 people had been tested to date, with 23,105 found negative against 1,950 positive cases.

As for the tahfiz cluster, 4,052 individuals have had their samples taken for testing from 11,166 at-risk people identified, and 325 were found positive.

There is also one new case reported from the Menara City One cluster, which is currently under an enhanced movement control order (EMCO), bringing the total in the cluster to 40.

Meanwhile, the Bali patient under investigation cluster saw an increase of four cases, raising the total to 37 cases.

Malaysia has tested over 105,000 individuals, with detection rate at 5%

On the rate of testing, Noor Hisham said Malaysia had now tested over 105,000 individuals to date, with 5,389 found positive, which means a positive testing rate of about 5%, as opposed to the 6% to 7% experienced in other countries.

Malaysia, Noor Hisham reiterated, has a testing capacity of 11,500 tests per day. The labs tested over 10,000 tests on Saturday.

“However, we use the targeted approach,” said Noor Hisham.

“Of the total, the close contact category makes up 31% of all our tests, followed by 10% from the Seri Petaling group and another 8% from the tahfiz cluster,” he said.

The most important thing, he said, is that the nationwide MCO appears to be working on lowering the number of new cases.

“Now, we have reduced [new daily cases] to two digits. We need to increase our efforts to further reduce this figure,” he added.
 

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