Rafdzah Ahmad Zaki: Malaysia unlikely to follow in Singapore’s footsteps

In an article published in the FMT on the 27 May 2020, Associate Professor Dr Rafdzah Ahmad Zaki said that more cases of Covid-19 would likely be seen in the days to come as a result of the new immigration depot clusters.

However, she said workers in Singapore have greater contact with the general public as dormitories there are within city borders. In Malaysia, she said, immigration centres are far from city centres and detainees have almost no contact with other communities.

She said a larger concern was the rising number of cases among foreign construction workers as these workers can move freely. Citing the Cheras security guard cluster and the cluster at a construction site in Setia Alam, she said it was important for the community to continue complying with standard operating procedures even if no new cases are reported in their areas.

Given the 14-day incubation period of the virus, she said, any increase in number of cases unrelated to immigration centres might reflect the impact of the government’s move on May 4 to relax constraints under the conditional movement control order as part of efforts to jumpstart the economy.

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