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KLANG: More Covid-19 cases are emerging in Klang, and the latest round of infections is said to have been detected at Tengku Ampuan Rahimah Hospital here, drawing severe criticism from your MP.
Nearly 100 people, among staff and hospitalized patients, reportedly tested positive for Covid-19 in recent weeks.
When contacted for confirmation on Thursday (December 17), Selangor Health Director Datuk Dr. Sha’ari Ngadiman said that he would release a statement on the matter later that day.
The patients are said to have tested negative when admitted for treatment and are believed to have contracted the virus in hospital.
Klang deputy Charles Santiago lashed out at the Health Ministry for allowing the hospital to keep the matter secret for so long.
“It is the recommendation of the World Health Organization that infections should be transmitted quickly to the public so that they can take their own precautions.
“It is very irresponsible for the hospital to have kept the matter hidden,” he said.
Santiago added that the “bureaucracy” was also a catalyst to keep information suppressed and hidden from the public.
“If you ask the district Health Department, they will tell you that they cannot release any information without the green light from the ministry,” he said.
He argued that such an approach would only make the situation worse with many unsuspecting people opening up to infection.
“People living in Klang have already started to panic due to the high number of cases in the district.
“They must be kept informed so that they can take their own steps to protect themselves and their families,” Santiago said.
Klang recently became the center of a large number of positive Covid-19 cases when employees at various factories in the district became infected.
A few months ago, more than 30 people who worked for a multinational company in Port Klang were infected with Covid-19.
The foreign workers lived here in seven units of the Prima Bayu apartments.
Their asymptomatic housemates were placed in home quarantine, and frightened neighbors hired security guards and placed them outside worker units to make sure they remained indoors.
More recently, the large-scale latex medical glove maker Top Glove Corporation Bhd became the conduit for the country’s largest Covid-19 infection group – the Teratai group, with more than 5,000 of its foreign workers infected.
A 29-year-old Top Glove worker, Yamnarayanan Chaudhary Tharu from Nepal, succumbed to the infection at Sungai Buloh Hospital last week.
The Selangor state government has conducted an assessment of residents living in four housing estates near the Top Glove factories in Meru.
According to the general manager of the state group of clinics Selcare, Mahdzir Ibrahim, there were a large number of positive cases among those who had come for the test.
Meru Assemblyman Mohd Fakhrulrazi Mohd Mokhtar said the infection could have occurred because local residents and Top Glove employees frequented the same neighborhood restaurants, grocery stores and services.
Lately, another Klang-based medical latex glove maker, Kossan Rubber Industries Bhd, released a statement that 427 of its employees had tested positive for Covid-19.
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