Dr Noor Hisham: Increase in workplace Covid-19 clusters worrying

KUALA LUMPUR, May 27 — Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah expressed concern today over a growing trend of Covid-19 clusters involving workplaces, particularly factories.

Between April 1 and May 26, he said the manufacturing sector was the main contributor to these workplace clusters, with 132 clusters or 46 per cent found from this sector.

“Although the government announced the implementation of MCO 3.0 starting on May 12, 2021, the trend of clusters at the workplace still showed no significant decline.

“A total of 115 workplace clusters with 5,392 cases were reported between May 12 and May 26, where more than half of the total involved the manufacturing sector (62 clusters, 53.4 per cent).

He added that the three states with the most workplace clusters between April 1 and May 26 were Selangor (74 clusters or 25.78 per cent), Johor (53 clusters or 18.47 per cent) and Penang (31 clusters or 10.8 per cent).

He said Malaysia also recorded 20 new Covid-19 today nationwide, with eight of them related to community transmissions, seven related to workplaces, three related with religious activities and one each related to an educational institute and holding facility respectively.

“A total of 512 new Covid-19 cases were discovered from these new clusters,” he said.

He then welcomed the Ministry of International Trade and Industry’s (Miti) new initiative known as Safe@Work to ensure the continuity of manufacturing operations with Covid-19 preventive measures such as the establishment of Covid-19 emergency response teams, periodic sanitation of premises, and ensuring safe and comfortable accommodations for employees.

“The Health Ministry also encourages employers to ensure that hand sanitisers are readily available at the workplace, employees are constantly wearing their masks, physical distancing is maintained and frequently perform disinfecting and sanitising processes, especially in shared spaces,” he said.