KJ: M'sia facing another Covid-19 wave, not at worrying level yet

The Health Ministry has announced that the country is facing a small Covid-19 wave, given a spike in case numbers recently.

Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin said that between October 23 and 29, new Covid-19 cases have increased by 16.5 percent to 16,917 cases from the previous week’s 14,250 cases.

He added that the number of patients admitted to government hospitals has increased by 14 percent for every 100,000 people within this same period. 

Khairy noted, however, that bed usage in intensive care units (ICU) had only increased by 2 percent, indicating that Covid-19 patients were not facing serious symptoms.

“Although hospital cases increased by 14 percent, ICU bed usage has only increased by 2 percent. 

“In other words, we are now facing a small (Covid-19) wave. It is uncertain if this small wave will become a big wave, that depends on the actions of the community within these next two weeks. 

“However, from a security aspect, at this moment it is not something to worry about,” he said at a press conference in Putrajaya today. 

Khairy said that the upward trend of cases was possibly due to the Omicron XBB subvariant. 

He said that four Covid-19 patients infected with the XBB subvariant have been identified in Malaysia thus far.

These four cases involved three men and a woman between the ages of 25 and 51, and faced Category 2 symptoms. 

Khairy cautioned the public to be careful and vigilant in the coming weeks, especially during the GE15 campaign period.

He said that while the use of face masks were not mandatory, the ministry “highly recommended” the public to wear them, especially in crowded areas. 

Bivalent vaccine 

In a separate development, the health minister announced that the country has procured Pfizer’s omicron-specific bivalent vaccine that is expected to arrive next month. 

The bivalent vaccine intends to cause the immune system to create antibodies against two different strains of the Covid-19 virus - the original strain and an Omicron strain.

However, Khairy advised those in high-risk categories to take any booster that is currently available in the meantime.

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