KUALA LUMPUR – The country’s efficiency in managing the COVID-19 pandemic continues to be recognised globally and this time through the ranking of the COVID Performance Index by Lowy Institute, a think tank based in Sydney, Australia.
According to the findings, Malaysia is in 16th place, ahead of Finland, Norway and South Korea, with an average score of 71 percent, three places below neighbouring Singapore, which is ranked 13th.
While it can be considered an encouraging achievement, local medical experts are of the opinion that the current COVID-19 situation in the country, which has claimed more than 700 lives and recorded more than 200,000 in cumulative cases, requires the government to make strategic changes.
President of the Malaysian Association of Public Health Physicians, Datuk Dr Zainal Ariffin Omar said this was mainly to prevent frontline workers from extreme fatigue that could affect their health and performance in discharging their duties.
The former World Health Organisation consultant for Non-Communicable Disease Prevention (NCD) programme in Vietnam said it was time for non-medical volunteers to be called as is the primary healthcare practice in Thailand and Vietnam.
Assigned simple tasks
According to him, the volunteers can be assigned to perform simple tasks, such as contact tracing, monitoring compliance with standard operating procedures and on those under home quarantine, as well as to disseminate health information, including in rural areas.
“It is better that we call for a million volunteers, representing 32 million people .. they must not be from existing government agencies that already have a huge workload.
“These volunteers have to be available in every locality in the towns and villages, and they must be trained with a specific module by an authority and given support. The National Disaster Management Agency and the National Security Council can coordinate and monitor,” he added.
Meanwhile, director of the Tropical Infectious Disease Research and Education Centre, Universiti Malaya, Prof Dr Sazaly Abu Bakar said Malaysia also needed to establish cooperation and exchange views with countries that managed to control mortality rate such as Singapore, Taiwan and China.
“If possible, we should also see the development in the treatment in other countries, for example China, which uses traditional methods,” he said.
Dr Sazaly also expressed the need for the views of experts from local universities to be considered and applied, rather than simply leaving the matter to the Health Ministry alone.
Prior to this, 46 health experts had proposed that a special COVID-19 task force be formed, with members comprising medical and economic experts, as well as from sectors, to provide advice and coordinate the responses from the various ministries and agencies in the government.
MCO but not like MCO
Commenting on the Movement Control Order (MCO), Dr Zainal said what is more important is to tighten the Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) so that the spread of the pandemic does not become worse and the goal to reduce the number of cases can be achieved.
“People are angry now because even MCO is imposed, the SOP is not fully complied with, it is as if there is no MCO. In fact, even if there is no MCO, it is alright, but the SOP is necessary, where compliance is vital to flatten the COVID-19 curve,” he said.
On Jan 25, Health Director-General Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said the MCO, which is scheduled to end on Feb 4, would not be extended to avoid negative effects on the country’s economy.
However, the following day, Senior Minister (Security Cluster) Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob said the decision whether to impose the MCO more strictly or return to the Conditional MCO (CMCO) would depend on the National Security Council.
Dr Zainal said if the MCO is ended and continued with CMCO, social gatherings or any gathering involving a large crowd, and also inter-state travel should be banned.
“Any event held indoor, such as kenduri, feast, birthday celebration that involve many people should not be allowed. Do like what is done in other countries, for example in Singapore, where a maximum of only five people are allowed at a social event.
“Apart from that, make wearing of face mask mandatory, that is, when you leave the house, you must automatically wear the face mask, or face action. Physical distancing should also be a priority, if there are many people gathered in shops or offices, take action,” he said.
Stricter action
Meanwhile, Dr Zainal said the government needed to take stricter action against manufacturers, like closing their factories, if there are report of their workers found positive with COVID-19.
“For factories that recorded high number of cases, the government needs to be more stern … in the past, only when it involved thousands of new cases were they ordered to close, but now if a factory records only one or two cases, it should be ordered to close,” he said.
He said the government should also let the people know of its strategies to fight COVID-19, like what was done by US President Joe Biden in releasing a 200-page of strategy to fight COVID-19 on his first day in office.
Dr Zainal Ariffin said the government could also implement the targeted MCO by ‘closing’ states that recorded high number of cases, such as Kuala Lumpur, Selangor and Johor.
He cautioned the public that even if MCO is lifted and replaced with other strategies, the estimated number of positive cases would not drop for at least 10 to 14 days following the COVID-19 incubation period.
Sharing Dr Zainal Ariffin’s views is a virologist from Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM), Associate Prof Dr Yahya Mat Arip , who said that what the country needs is targeted MCO, rather than it being implemented nationwide.
Balance needed
“As we are aware of the impact of MCO on the society, especially in terms of economy, but at the same time, we need to deal with the COVID-19 … there is a need to balance these two.
“The authorities have identified several sectors that are ‘hotspots’ to the COVID-19 cases, so it is possible that the MCO can be targeted to these sectors,” he said, adding that an ideal period would be for 14 days.
He said regardless of the implementation of MCO, CMCO or the Recovery MCO, it would be a futile effort to curb the spread of COVID-19 if public awareness is low.
He said implementation of MCO is a physical effort to preventing the COVID-19 virus from finding new “host” (human).
Which is why during the MCO, the government limits the movement and close interaction of ‘hosts’ so that infection to new ‘hosts’ could be prevented, he added.
He said public awareness in complying with the prescribed SOPs is very important.
“We need to look at the society in New Zealand on their compliance with the SOPs and their success. Majority understand the importance in complying with the SOP, but some don’t, and they are the ones that bring problems,” he added.
Therefore, he said, vaccination is the way to deal with the COVID-19 problem in the society, where by making them immune to the disease, the country will have a better chance of curbing the spread of the virus.
