KUCHING, June 5: A prayer ceremony for 40 days has become a superspreader event that caused 59 people from five longhouses in Banting and one longhouse in Kerepok to be infected with Covid-19, triggering the Banting Cluster in Sri Aman.
It is one of four new Covid-19 clusters being declared in Sarawak today.
The State Disaster Management Committee (SDMC), in its daily updates on the Covid-19 situation in Sarawak, revealed that the outbreak stemmed from a 40-day prayer ceremony held on May 22 at a longhouse in Banting which was also attended by villagers from nearby longhouses.
The community cluster involved five longhouses in Banting and one longhouse in Kerepok which are located in the Lingga area of Sri Aman.
A total of 262 individuals have been screened whereby 155 tested negative for the virus while 48 are still awaiting their lab test results.
All positive cases have been referred to the Sarawak General Hospital (SGH) and Sri Aman Hospital as well as admitted to the Quarantine and Low-Risk Treatment Centres (PKRCs) of Kuching and Sri Aman for treatment and isolation.
Meanwhile, the three other new clusters that emerged today are the Skim B Cluster in Meradong linked to a communal pig slaughtering activity for Hari Gawai festival with 28 cases, the Ijis Pengelayan Cluster in Miri due to a Gawai Antu celebration (55 cases) and the workplace Kampung Yoh Cluster in Sebauh (58 cases).
SDMC also declared the end of the Jelalong Cluster in Sebauh today after no new local cases were reported in the last 28 days.
With that, the number of active clusters in Sarawak stands at 80, out of which 16 clusters recorded an increase in daily infections of 119 cases. — DayakDaily
