PUTRAJAYA, Oct 27 — As many as 30 per cent or 62 of the 230 Covid-19 clusters reported in Malaysia since the beginning of the pandemic are linked to workplaces, said Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah.
He said 70 per cent was due to active detection and contact tracing carried out among the communities in the administratively enforced targeted enhanced movement control order (TEMCO) areas.
He said until today, there were 37 workplace-related clusters that were still active, including two new clusters today, namely the Lintas cluster in Sabah and the Limbungan cluster in Labuan.
Dr Noor Hisham expressed his appreciation to employers and private companies in helping to curb the spread of Covid-19 among employees.
“The proactive measures taken by employers who also conducted Covid-19 screening for their staff enabled the detection of asymptomatic cases and assisted the Health Ministry (MOH) in carrying out public health activities promptly,” he told a press conference here today.
Dr Noor Hisham said the proactive measures taken by employers while helping the country curb the spread of of Covid-19 among the people also protects individuals from high-risk groups, the elderly and children.
He said employees should also play a role in helping to prevent the transmission of Covid-19 in the workplace by complying with the standard operating procedure (SOP).
On the situation in Sabah, Dr Noor Hisham said the MOH was doing its best in terms of adjustment and innovation to enhance the health system to contain the pandemic effectively.
He said the biggest challenge in Sabah was the logistic issues, however, coordination with other agencies as a team will help contain the infection.
Meanwhile, Dr Noor Hisham said the conditional movement control order (CMCO) in Sabah had shown positive results especially in the east coast of Sabah as cases there had decreased.
“But in the west coast, as it is in the acceleration phase, we need to step up our public health intervention,” he said.
— Bernama
