By Adrian Lim
KUCHING, Oct 27: Kuching returned into a Covid-19 red zone as Sarawak registered 16 new additional cases today.
This was revealed by State Disaster Management Committee (SDMC) chairman Datuk Amar Douglas Uggah Embas during a press conference.
Uggah said 12 of the 16 new cases were derived from Kg Haji Baki or the Baki Cluster.
He added that Kuching recorded 49 positive cases of Covid-19 in the past 14 days and as a result, Kuching was declared a red zone of Covid-19.
“There were 12 new cases detected through active case detection (ACD) at Kg Haji Baki.
“The cases were swabbed on October 24 and the results of the rapid test polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) on October 25 identified that they were positive of Covid-19.
“They were all close contacts to the index case of Baki Cluster,” he said.
Uggah revealed that the patients were aged between 7 and 75 years old whereby three were primary school students, two were secondary school students, five adults and two elderly persons.
“All the cases were admitted to Sarawak General Hospital (SGH) for further medical treatment.
“Four cases of local transmissions today were identified from three close contacts who performed self Covid-19 swab test at private healthcare facilities and one from ACD on October 25 by the State Health Department.” Uggah asserted.
With 16 new cases, Uggah who is also Deputy Chief Minister noted the cumulative number of Covid-19 cases in Sarawak has increased to 819 cases.
He also disclosed that there were four active Covid-19 clusters in Sarawak namely the “Bah Arnab”, Putra, Seladah and Baki cluster.
Uggah said there were no new cases from the three clusters except the Baki Cluster.
With the new 12 cases, he said the cumulative number of positive Covid-19 for the Baki Cluster increased to 25 cases.
Uggah revealed that a total of 845 individuals were screened during an ACD conducted by the State Health Department at Kg Haji Baki on October 25.
He said 25 were positive while the results of 744 individuals were negative and 101 individuals who had been screened were awaiting laboratory test results.
On another note, Uggah said there were four patients who recovered and were allowed to be discharged from the hospitals while 64 patients are still receiving treatment at the isolation wards in the hospitals.
Apart from that, Uggah said there were 20 new cases of Person-Under-Investigation (PUI) and three PUI cases were awaiting laboratory test results.—DayakDaily
