By DayakDaily Team
SIBU, Sept 2: Sarawak is seeing a rise in upper respiratory tract infection (URTI) cases as haze continues to affect air quality across the State, with weekly cases recently climbing to about 1,752.
According to the Sarawak Public Communications Unit (Ukas), Deputy Health Minister Dato Hanifah Hajar Taib said the increase was detected through monitoring at 15 sentinel health facilities statewide, where average weekly URTI cases rose from about 1,717 at the beginning of the year.
“Conjunctivitis cases also showed an increasing trend, rising from about 17 cases per week to 21 cases per week during the same period.
“Special attention was given to URTI cases, which increased sharply in mid-August, with the Southern Zone recording about 1,250 cases, the Central Zone more than 1,000 cases and the Northern Zone peaking at close to 400 cases,” she said during an official visit to the Jalan Oya Health Clinic yesterday (Sept 1).
Hanifah, who is also the Mukah Member of Parliament, said the sentinel facilities recorded about 694,800 patient visits from January to August 2026, including 64,688 URTI cases and 6,156 asthma cases.
She said asthma cases at the Sarawak General Hospital’s (SGH) Emergency and Trauma Department also increased on several days in August.
However, statewide monitoring showed that asthma cases remained generally stable, with no significant or sustained increase recorded.
Hanifah said the Sarawak Health Department is stepping up surveillance of haze-related illnesses to ensure emerging trends are detected early.
“This is also to reinforce medical services and ensure adequate supplies of medicines and equipment, as well as sufficient healthcare personnel at hospitals and health clinics,” she said.
She added that continuous monitoring would be carried out to track changes in haze-related illnesses and enable appropriate measures to be taken promptly. — DayakDaily
