By Karen Bong
KUCHING, Oct 15: Two illegal immigrants from Indonesia were among the four new imported Covid-19 cases recorded in Sarawak today.
With three cases in Kuching and one case in Miri, this latest increase raised Sarawak’s total numbers of cases to 759.
State Disaster Management Committee (SDMC) chairman Datuk Amar Douglas Uggah Embas revealed that the two illegal immigrants (Case 756 and 757) from West Kalimantan have entered Sarawak on Oct 12.
“They went for health and Covid-19 screening in a private hospital in Kuching as it was the condition to work in Sarawak.
“As they were found to have entered Sarawak illegally, they did not undergo mandatory 14-days quarantine upon arrival. They were swabbed on Oct 14 and the result returned positive,” he told a press conference on Covid-19 in Sarawak today.
The two cases, he said, were asymptomatic and investigation found they were infected in their home country of Kalimantan, Indonesia before arriving in Sarawak.
They were now isolated and treated in Sarawak General Hospital (SGH) while further investigation and contact tracing are currently being carried out.
Case 759, Uggah continued, was the close contact to Case 752 detected through contact tracing conducted by the Samarahan Division and Kuching Division Health Offices.
“The case is also a close family member to Case 752. The case who stays in Kuching and visited Case 752 while the latter was observing quarantine at home in Samarahan.
“On Oct 13, the case went for screening at a government health clinic which result was positive the next day. The case also did not show any symptoms and is not in SGH for treatment,” he added.
Uggah, who is also Deputy Chief Minister, explained that this case was categorised as local transmission but infected in a district which was different from its permanent address which is Import C.
Up until 12pm today, he reported that six individuals have been screened whereby two were positive of Covid-19, four negative and no cases pending lab test report.
Case 758 involved an offshore worker, who had travelled to Kota Kinabalu and transited in Labuan, before arriving in Miri Airport on Oct 10.
“The local man had been on the liquified natural gas (LNG) vessel off the coast of Sabah since Sept 3 before signing off duty on Oct 10.
“Upon arrival at Miri Airport, the case was registered into a quarantine centre and took the first screening on Oct 13 which result returned positive the next day,” he said.
The case had a sore throat on Oct 8 and is now isolated and treated in Miri Hospital. Contact tracing is currently actively being carried out.
Meanwhile, three patients had recovered and been discharged with two from Miri Hospital and one from Sibu Hospital today.
“This increased the total number of recovered cases in Sarawak to 694 or 91.44 per cent of total positive cases so far,” Uggah shared.
A total of 46 patients were receiving treatment in hospitals in the state currently with 28 in SGH, eight in Miri Hospital, seven in Bintulu Hospital and three in Bintulu Hospital.
There were two clusters remaining active in Sarawak namely the Bah Arnab Cluster in Kuching with four cases and Putra Cluster in Bintulu with six cases including the index case.
For the Bah Arnab Cluster, 36 individuals had tested negative and no one was awaiting lab test results.
There were no new cases reported in Putra Cluster and one of the six positive cases were registered in Selangor.
As of 12pm today, a total of 148 contacts have tested negative and 36 individuals were still awaiting lab test results. A total of 75 individuals were screened for the second time on the 10th day with two negative and 75 pending lab test results.
Four districts namely Kuching, Sibu, Bintulu and Lubok Antu maintained as yellow zone with total 13 local transmission cases recorded within the past 14 days.
Sarawak also recorded five more persons-under-investigation (PUI) with no cases pending laboratory test results.
There were also 85 more persons-under-surveillance (PUS) registered into identified hotels to undergo quarantine.
As of today, there were a total number of 1,822 individuals undergoing quarantine in 22 hotels throughout the state. —DayakDaily
