KOTA KINABALU, Jan 19 — Some 18 examination year students in Sabah set to return to school hostels have tested positive for Covid-19 in the last two days, a state official said.

Sabah Covid-19 spokesman Datuk Seri Masidi Manjun said that authorities detected 10 more students yesterday, adding to the eight cases found on Sunday.

"Out of the total new cases (January 18), 10 of them were from mass screening of students entering hostels,” he said in a press conference yesterday.

The day before, eight cases were detected.

Masidi said Sabah district health offices have been screening students who are allowed to return to school hostels for Covid-19 since January 16.

Only those sitting for the SPM and STPM 2020 and 2021 were allowed to be in the hostels for the school term starting January 20.

He said that the health and education authorities have outlined standard operating procedures to be followed, which includes Covid-19 screening.

"This is to prevent an outbreak among the hostels,” he said.

Sabah yesterday registered 432 new Covid-19 cases, of which 10 were from hostel screenings. The others were from close contact screening (308 cases or 71.3 per cent), symptomatic screening (62 cases or 14.4 per cent, new and existing clusters (20 cases or 4.6 per cent), plantation screenings (15 cases or 3.5 per cent) and 17 cases from other categories.