THE Health Ministry (MOH) acknowledged that the Beta variant from South Africa had been detected in all states, adding it may have spread among the community as well.
“That’s why we need to tighten our borders to ensure other Variants of Concern (VOC) and the most dangerous one, Delta, do not arrive at our shores.
“However, I would like stress that our vaccines are effective to curb the spread of these variants,” its director general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said to Bernama, in a programme entitled “The Nation”, yesterday.
For the last two days, Malaysia has been recording more than 9,000 daily infections, with Selangor and Kuala Lumpur recording the highest number of infections.
Fatalities have also breached the 6,000 mark, with many new clusters appearing at workplaces.
On that note, Noor Hisham said that Malaysia needed to vaccinate at least 50% of the population in order to avert more infections, as can be seen in countries with high vaccination rate.
“With the authorities providing over 300,000 vaccinations daily, I believe we can speed up our process to achieve herd immunity.
“If we continue inoculating at this rate, we could vaccinate between 70% and 80% of the population by September,” he added.
On the high infection in the Klang Valley, Noor Hisham said that it was expected as the MOH was conducting mass screenings at high-risk areas.
He added that MOH had also increased resources in the hospitals located in the Klang Valley, such as Tengku Ampuan Rahimah Hospital, Kuala Lumpur Hospital, Selayang Hospital and UKM Children’s Hospital to meet surging number of infections.
“Among the things we did was to add more beds at the hospitals, get support from private hospitals and mobilise staffers from other states such as Perak, Terengganu and Pahang,” Noor Hisham stated.
On intensive care units (ICU) running out of beds, he mentioned that it happened as Category 4 and 5 patients needed to be kept longer at the hospitals, due to serious complications arising from COVID-19 infections.
“Those under Category 4 need about 14 to 16 days to recover, while those under Category 5 need between 19 and 26 days,” Noor Hisham explained. – July 11, 2021.
