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KUALA LUMPUR – More than half of Selangor’s active clusters are attributed to the manufacturing sector, said Menteri Besar Datuk Seri Amirudin Shari today.
In a video statement posted on his social media accounts, he said 54% or 96 active clusters in the state are from the manufacturing sector, while 22 (12%) are from the services industry and 9 (5%) are community clusters.
He said in an effort to treat active cases, the state has sent 3,000 oxygen tanks to the low-risk treatment and quarantine centre in MAEPS Serdang.
“The state will also increase the capacity of critical and non-critical beds to treat Covid-19 patiens who are in Categories 3 to 5.
“Sg Buloh, Ampang, Selayang and Serdang hospitals are now facilities used to exclusively treat Covid-19 patients. The field facilities in Tengku Ampuan Rahimah Hospital in Klang has been operational since August 6.
“Some 27 assessment centres (CACs) are open in the state, excluding online CACs. To increase the number of vehicles used to ferry patients, those belonging to the government and state-linked companies, (as well as) school vans will be mobilised – in addition to public and private ambulances.”
On July 14, the Federation of Malaysian Manufacturers (FMM) wanted to clear misconceptions on repeated allegations in the media that factories are a primary source of Covid-19 infections.
Quoting data from the Health Ministry, FMM president Tan Sri Soh Thian Lai said in a statement today that the majority of cases, especially this year, have been sporadic ones, and did not originate from clusters, including workplace clusters.
It is evident, Soh said, from data released by the ministry on June 21 that 69% (398,846 out of 578,105) of Covid-19 cases recorded this year until June 19 were sporadic cases.
“While it must be acknowledged that the risk of factory infections cannot be totally eliminated, especially now with the high percentage of sporadic cases and with the virus in the community, this most certainly cannot be equated to the lack of standard operating procedure (SOP) compliance by factories and is a very unfair conclusion to be made.
“With the rise in sporadic cases, managing the entry of infections into the factory or hostels has become more challenging for the industry despite the SOPs and preventive measures in place, including swab tests, because the virus may still enter factories especially through asymptomatic sporadic cases,” he said.
Soh said these infections were often not traced back to the community where they most likely originated from, but to the factories, as one community-related infection among workers leads to more workers getting tested due to close contact tracing.
“This, in turn, is reported as a workplace cluster by the authorities, giving rise to the misconception that workplaces, especially factories, are the primary source of infection.
“Hence, it is important that the government makes its lockdown decisions based on science and data, and not on misconceptions,” he added.
Soh also recommended that the government only close specific companies where cases of Covid-19 are detected and not declare the enhanced movement control order (EMCO) on an entire area or state, or impose strict operation conditions on all businesses.
“It is unfair to unaffected companies, especially those that have a clean record and have maintained the highest levels of SOPs and workplace preventive measures.
“Businesses cannot be sustained if factory operations are closed or reduced in capacity.” – The Vibes, August 9, 2021
