COVID-19 weekly round-up: Sivagangga cluster fuel local transmissions

Local transmissions reported this week were dominated by the Sivagangga PUI (persons under investigation) cluster in Kedah, the first five cases of which were reported by the Ministry of Health on July 28.

As of noon yesterday, a total of 2,351 people from this cluster was screened, out of which 30 tested positive for COVID-19. Another 1,617 tested negative while 704 are still awaiting test results.

At a media briefing yesterday, Health director-general Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah expressed his concern that the Sivagangga cluster may be linked to a super-spreader strain of COVID-19 that originated from countries such as Egypt and Pakistan.

He said this is in view of the fact that the Sivagangga cluster had a faster rate of transmission than other clusters in other states such as Sarawak.

MOH, he added, will conduct a thorough test and will cultivate the virus in the laboratory to study its genomic sequence.

The cluster’s index case is a restaurant owner in Kedah who is a permanent resident and returned from India on July 13. He had allegedly violated his home quarantine rules and a photograph of him sitting in his restaurant has gone viral on social media.

The Sivagangga cluster contributed one new case on Saturday (Aug 1), Sunday 11 cases, Monday one case, Wednesday three cases and yesterday six cases.

Over the 24-hour period up to noon yesterday, 15 new COVID-19 cases were reported, bringing the total number of cases to 9,038 and active cases to 200.

Eleven patients were discharged yesterday, bringing the total number of recoveries to 8,713 (96.4 percent of total COVID-19 cases in Malaysia). Two patients are being treated in the intensive care unit with one requiring respiratory aid.

The death tally remained at 125 (1.38 percent of total cases).

At his media briefing on Monday, Dr Noor Hisham listed out other active clusters caused by imported cases that flouted the government’s Home Surveillance Order that was issued on June 10.

The clusters are the Novgorod PUI cluster, Elsa cluster, Pitakwa PUI cluster, Melbourne PUI cluster, Ramnad PUI cluster, Al Khobar PUI cluster and Shirala PUI cluster.

Senior Minister (Security Cluster) Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob, at a press conference yesterday, said between July 24 and Aug 5, a total of 6,473 individuals returned to Malaysia through the main entry points and were placed in 26 hotels and five public training institutes in Kuala Lumpur, Selangor, Negeri Sembilan, Penang, Johor, Sarawak, Kelantan, Perak and Perlis for a compulsory 14-day quarantine.

A total of 18 individuals from among them were hospitalised after they tested positive for COVID-19.

Ismail Sabri said the government viewed the non-compliance of the mandatory home quarantine order seriously and so far 80 individuals were found to have breached the regulation.

-- BERNAMA