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Malaysian Medical Association president Dr Subramaniam Muniandy said those who have other illnesses suffered more with Covid-19.
“But a lot of people in this country do not recognise or know of their comorbidities,” he told FMT, adding that diabetes and hypertension were especially common.
“Having regular medical check-ups is not a practice in our country. People don’t usually look for a doctor until they are sick.”
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Subramaniam explained that this was why it was important for people to get vaccinated, as it increased resistance against the virus and protected those with comorbidities from becoming seriously ill.
When one’s cardiorespiratory (heart and lungs) system is affected, they become weak and often succumb to the virus, he said.
Bandar Kuching MP Dr Kelvin Yii said the overwhelmed healthcare system caused patients to be admitted later – when they were already suffering with severe symptoms and were more difficult to treat.
Another factor was because the contact tracing system was breaking down, he said.
Yii, who heads the parliamentary select committee on health, science and innovation, said the fundamentals of infectious disease control such as FFTIS (finding, testing, tracing, isolating and supporting) must not be ignored.
“Even with the high rate of vaccination, we still need to ramp up testing to detect, isolate and treat as soon as possible,” he said.
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“This is even more important to protect the different states from suffering another Klang Valley-type tragedy where the healthcare system is overwhelmed and the number of deaths is high.”
He called for a national testing plan to determine who, when and how often to test, as well as what happens after.
On top of this, he suggested that Putrajaya mobilise more personnel to conduct contact tracing on the ground.
“They have mobilised thousands of volunteers to help with the vaccination, so they can do this for contact tracing, including incorporating artificial intelligence (AI) to help.”
Yii also said the government must subsidise Covid-19 self-test kits to make it accessible to all. These should be distributed to B40 communities and high-risk areas to help break the chain of transmission.
Malaysia recorded a record high 360 deaths on Sunday, with 85 or 24% of them being BID cases.
The health ministry had said 80% of BID cases had not been diagnosed with Covid-19 before their death. They previously saw 80 to 100 BID cases a week, many of which were foreigners.
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