COVID-19: MoH found 69 sporadic cases with no clear infection source

KUALA LUMPUR (April 7): The Ministry of Health has found 69 positive COVID-19 cases that could not be traced to any clear source of infection and do not appear to be related to any of the identified main clusters of infections.

Also known as sporadic cases, MoH director-general Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said the number of such cases is small compared with the total number of confirmed cases, which has reached 3,963 today.

"The ones we have detected, there are 69 sporadic cases. We don't know how they got the infection," he told a press conference today.

The ministry has so far done COVID-19 screening on 8,025 samples from the field for sporadic cases and 69 came back positive, while the remainder 7,956 were negative.

The tests were mostly done based on patients with influenza-like illnesses (ILI) and severe acute respiratory infections (SARI). This was due to the potential of SARI patients to later test positive for Covid-19.

Dr Noor Hisham also reiterated that frontline medical workers should treat all those who have been diagnosed with SARI at clinics and hospitals as COVID-19 positive cases, until tests prove otherwise.

Among the main infection clusters identified so far were a tabligh assembly in Seri Petaling, a church event in Kuching, a wedding in Bandar Baru Bangi, as well as Malaysians returning from high-risk countries.

On the tabligh assembly, Dr Noor Hisham updated that 20,035 samples have been taken so far, with 1,657 coming back positive and 13,744 negative, while 4,634 are still waiting for results. This cluster now accounts for about 42% of the country's total Covid-19 cases.

Dr Noor Hisham further explained that there are five categories of COVID-19 infections: Category 1 is for positive cases with no symptoms, Category 2 is for positive cases with mild symptoms, Category 3 is for positive cases with pneumonia, Category 4 is for pneumonia cases that require oxygen, and Category 5 is for cases that require breathing assistance.

"In Malaysia, 88% of confirmed COVID-19 cases fall into Category 1 and 2, 7% in Category 3 and only 5% in Category 4 and 5. Patients being put under intensive care units (ICU) make up about 10% globally, compared with less than 5% in Malaysia," he added.

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