HTAR to receive 151 extra beds today - MOH

MOH secretary-general Datuk Mohd Shafiq Abdullah said that for the COVID-19 Intensive Care Unit (ICU), the hospital would increase its capacity from 51 beds to 72 beds soon.

"We have added several critical facilities in the emergency area after it had gone viral (on social media) as if they were abandoned but it is a normal process to move patients between wards and it takes time," he told Bernama after a working visit to HTAR yesterday.

In an earlier statement, HTAR said that it had changed the functions of the trainee doctors' dormitory and day treatment complex to temporary wards to accommodate COVID-19 patients since last Friday.

On the aspect of allocation for additional medical equipment in dealing with COVID-19, Mohd Shafiq said the MOH had so far distributed allocations to all health facilities nationwide under the emergency procurement totalling RM747 million.

"More than RM100 million has been given in Selangor alone to make emergency procurement. These procurements must be done fast, cannot follow the normal process," he said.

Meanwhile, Selangor Health Department director Datuk Dr Sha'ari Ngadiman said HTAR would still maintain the status of a hybrid hospital as it was a state referral hospital.

He added that all the hospitals in Selangor were still capable of accepting both COVID-19 and non-COVID-19 patients and that the country's medical institutions were always on standby.