JOHOR BARU, May 8 — The Johor Health Department recently conducted a Covid-19 screening on 317 students of several madrasahs here as a preventive measure, said state health and environment committee chairman R. Vidyananthan.
He said the screening was conducted as a follow-up to the clusters associated with the Sri Petaling gathering cluster.
“The students and teachers in several madrasahs in the state were gathered and the screening process was conducted at the Madrasah Ad’disiratil Islamiyyah in Kampung Sinaran Skudai here,” said Vidyananthan.
Vidyananthan said the screening process took place from 12pm to 6pm on Wednesday with sampling from the Pasir Gudang Health Clinic, Mahmoodiah Health Clinic, Tampoi Health Clinic and Sultan Ismail Health Clinic.
“All Johor Health Department staff remained diligent in the task of filtering out samples despite the difficult conditions during Ramadan when they have to work continuously until some were tired and dehydrated.
“However, the students and teaching staff of the madrasahs gave good cooperation throughout the sampling process,” said Vidyananthan in a statement during his daily Covid-19 briefing for Johor.
On the integrated operation involving the conditional movement control order (CMCO), Vidyananthan said the state’s special task force on compliance conducted inspections at 4,325 business and other premises as of yesterday.
“The task force includes agencies such as the police, Malaysian Armed Forces, the People’s Volunteer Corps (Rela), local authorities, the Civil Defence Force and the Johor Health Department,” he said.
Meanwhile, Vidyananthan said the Johor government was also concerned about a new cluster involving security guards at a shopping mall in Cheras, Kuala Lumpur, as announced by the Health Ministry’s director-general Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah yesterday.
As such, he said the Johor government would like to remind employers in the state to screen all foreign workers to prevent the emergence of new clusters.
“Although we have entered the CMCO period, the Johor Health Department remains committed to ensuring that the Covid-19 pandemic remains under control in the state,” said Vidyananthan.
