The Ministry of Health has predicted that Covid-19 cases will increase to 3,000 daily by the end of May if the rate of infectivity continues to rise.
Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah has been sharing the rate of infectivity every day with the value remaining below 0.9 in the past few weeks. However, the rate of infectivity has been rising recently and has hit 0.98 as of 23 March.
The rate of infectivity is measured using the R0 (pronounced R-naught) value. For example, an R0 value of 1.5 means that one infected person is able to transmit the virus to 1.5 other people.
Now that the R0 value has increased to 0.98, the projected number of daily cases is expected to reach 3,000 once again by the end of May if the rate of infectivity does not drop.
“(The) Covid-19 pandemic is one of the biggest health crises of our time. Multiple evidence-based public health guidelines and SOPs have been issued,” Dr Noor Hisham said on Twitter.
“More importantly is to comply with all the measures and SOPs. Non-compliance will lead us back to square ONE as shown in the red trajectory.”
It has been three weeks since the Movement Control Order (MCO) was lifted on 5 March, with all economic sectors being reopened and inter-district travels allowed.
Crowds gathering outside KL mall during Chinese New Year 2021
According to the Minister of Health, Dr Adham Baba, 66% of Covid-19 cases over the last two weeks were sporadic, indicating widespread community transmission, reported Code Blue.
On 22 March at a joint press conference by the Covid-19 Immunisation Task Force (CITF), he said that between 8 and 21 March, 13,185 Covid-19 cases were sporadic while only 6,751 cases were linked to clusters.
“That means, within two weeks, we have 66% cases which are sporadic and 33.8% which belong to clusters,” he said.
We hope everyone will continue to comply with the standard operating procedures (SOP) while you’re out and about. We have already come this far and we do not want the cases to rise again.
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