KUCHING, Sept 12 — Sarawak United People’s Party (SUPP) Women chief Kho Teck Wan tonight urged the state Health Department and Sarawak Disaster Management Committee (SDMC) to rope in private doctors to conduct daily health assessments on Covid-19 patients under home quarantine via the phone.
She said such an arrangement would indirectly improve the quality of healthcare for such patients.
She added that 29,788 Covid-19 positive individuals in Categories 1 and 2 are quarantining at home in Sarawak as of today. This means they are either asymptomatic or showing mild symptoms
“Private doctors can escalate any case that needs medical attention to the government hospital, which could potentially prevent Brought-in-Dead (BID) cases,” she said in a statement.
“Although those in home quarantine are required to update their health condition via MySejahtera and a Google form daily, a system to quickly identify and retrieve a patient whose health condition has progressively deteriorated at home should be put in place immediately,” she said.
She noted that two BID cases were reported by SDMC in Kuching today, involving two males, aged 38 and 46, who had no known pre-existing medical conditions.
She said one tested positive for Covid-19 on September 8 and the other two days later.
Kho said the state Health Department and SDMC should also consider outsourcing physical Covid-19 Assessment Centres (CAC) to private practice doctors for a fixed period.
She said this would allow more government healthcare personnel to be placed in hospital settings where they can concentrate on saving critically ill patients.
“As we work towards living with Covid-19, our focus should be on saving lives and reducing daily deaths due to Covid-19,” Kho said.
