This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily on March 31, 2020 - April 6, 2020

KUALA LUMPUR: There were 156 new confirmed infections yesterday, bringing the total number of Covid-19 cases in Malaysia to 2,626. Meanwhile, three more people died of the disease, raising the death toll to 37.

Health director-general Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said in a statement that 91 patients were discharged yesterday — the highest in a single day thus far — bringing the total number of complete recoveries from Covid-19 and discharges to 479, which accounts for 18.2% of all cases.

Meanwhile, 94 patients are being treated in intensive care, with 62 of them needing ventilators.

Noor Hisham said the 35th death involved a 57-year-old woman who suffered from diabetes and had travelled to Indonesia. She died at 4pm on Sunday.

The 36th patient was a 47-year-old man who passed away at 8am yesterday, while the 37th fatality was a 46-year-old woman who had high blood pressure and an autoimmune disease. She passed away at 9.02am yesterday.

Government increases testing, treatment capacity

In the statement, Noor Hisham said 70 public hospitals across the country are now able to conduct health screenings for Covid-19, compared with 57 in February.

Meanwhile, the number of hospitals able to treat Covid-19 patients has risen to 38 from 26 prior, thanks to a collaboration with the armed forces and University of Malaya Medical Centre.

Seven of these hospitals specialise in treating Covid-19 patients, he added.

In addition, the number of beds to treat patients has also risen to 3,994.

“The MoH (ministry of health) is also planning to add several beds by identifying and modifying its training institutions into quarantine and treatment centres, with a total capacity of 1,937 beds,” he said, adding that the capacity of these centres can be increased if needed.

Other facilities are also being identified, such as the Malaysia Agro Exposition Park Serdang, which can hold up to 600 beds.

Infection rate in Malaysia still stable

Speaking at a press conference, Noor Hisham said the Covid-19 infection rate in Malaysia is still stable, seeing there has been no “exponential spike” in new cases so far compared to other countries.

“Looking at the last two weeks, the cases are still quite stable. What we fear is if we have an exponential spike of maybe 900 or 1,000 cases [a day], but we do not have that. Every day, perhaps we are getting around 150-200 new cases,” he told a press conference yesterday.

Noor Hisham said the MoH has managed to contain the spread of Covid-19, as it has undergone “active case detection”, whereby high-risk groups are identified, tested and isolated. This, he said, helps break the chain of Covid-19 transmission in the country.

He explained that as long as the number of new cases are maintained at 150-200 cases daily, the outbreak is still manageable.

“Nonetheless, we are prepared for the worst,” he said.

“That is the reason why we have the (additional) beds ready and we have all the temporary hospitals and even in our ministry’s training institutes, we also have 19,200 beds ready for that. So, we are prepared for the worst but we hope for the best,” Noor Hisham added.

With regard to the next two weeks of the movement control order, Noor Hisham advised everyone to practice social discipline by continuing to abide by the order. This, he said, is part of efforts to flatten the curve and avoid an exponential growth in the number of new cases.

“What we need to do now is to focus on the imported cases — Malaysians coming back from overseas. That is the group that we are worried the most, that will bring back Covid-19.