KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 17 ― The Hospital Tengku Ampuan Rahimah (HTAR) in Klang has an outbreak of Covid-19, Selangor Health director Datuk Dr Sha’ari Ngadiman confirmed this evening, hours after news first erupted.
He said the contagion was likely because the hospital was in a Covid-19 red zone and had been treating a large number of patients with Severe Acute Respiratory Infections (SARI), though he stressed that it has been in full compliance of Covid regulations and that its frontliners were always wearing the personal protective equipment when on duty.
“At this time, 50 medical staff have been infected with Covid-19 and are being treated at Hospital Sungai Buloh,” he said in a statement on the Selangor Health Department Facebook page.
He confirmed there were inpatients who have been infected but was silent on their numbers.
He stressed that the situation is under control and that all contacts have undergone a Covid-19 swab test and have been put on a home surveillance order (HSO).
Dr Sha’ari said both HTAR and the state Health Department have not been able to determine the source of the Covid-19 outbreak this time, “whether it was before the patient was warded or whether it was when the patient was in the 14-day incubation period”.
He advised the public not to go to HTAR unless they had an emergency and not to share unverified information.
Several news outlets, including Malaysiakini, had reported the outbreak earlier today, citing unverified sources with at least 40 staff and 50 in-patients said to have contracted the coronavirus.
Selangor continued to lead Malaysia’s daily Covid-19 infections with 368 patients or 30.2 per cent of all cases today.
Its cumulative cases currently stand at 22,931 ― putting it at second place overall, just behind Sabah.
Klang, the industrial district that is home to many factories, including Top Glove, the world’s biggest maker of rubber gloves.
Malaysia’s biggest Covid-19 outbreak, the Teratai Cluster, had erupted within Top Glove’s worker dormitories in Klang and has since come under the government’s microscope to improve housing and worker welfare to curb the coronavirus from spreading further.