Goh
KOTA KINABALU: The Federation of Chinese Associations Malaysia (Huazong) has urged the federal government to expedite the Covid-19 immunisation program for Sabah and Sarawak, so that these two states could get out of the red zone or conditional Movement Control Order (CMCO), and towards achieving the target of “total immunisation”.
Its president, Tan Sri T.C Goh thus proposed that, besides giving priority to the frontliners, elderly and high-risk groups of individuals, the government should also prioritise those who are currently in the red zones or under enhanced MCO (EMCO).
He believes this could help to better contain and curtail the spread of Covid-19 in the affected regions.
He noted that, while a total of 524,000 individuals registered in the first phase of the National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme had completed receiving both doses of their vaccine shots, which is equivalent to 1.7% of the total population in Malaysia, Sabah is currently the state with the lowest number of individuals registered for vaccination, hence the government must step up efforts to better improve the figures.
Goh, who is also President of the Federation of Chinese Associations Malaysia (Huazong) was commenting on the reversing of Sabah’s Covid-19 status, from recovery MCO (RMCO) to conditional MCO (CMCO), effective from April 29 until May 17.
This was following a series of spikes in Covid-19 cases which significantly reduced the green zones and increased red zones in the state. Besides this, currently there are also 33 localities which are placed under EMCO.
He also noted that in the latest announcement of CMCO for Sabah made by the government, the regulations (SOPs) in place during the previous recovery MCO will be maintained. This includes business hours maintained as in RMCO, dine in is allowed, and economic and education sectors remain open.
He thus commended the government for striking a good balance between fighting Covid-19 and keeping the economy going, by requiring the people and businesses to continue to fully comply with the SOPs, while getting on with their daily affairs.
Besides this, Goh also hoped the government, especially the Ministry of Health (MoH) could deploy more doctors and medical staff to Sabah to help tackle and contain the Covid-19 spikes, especially in the east coast of Sabah, where the situation was reportedly more pressing. It was recently reported that Tawau district hospital was facing acute shortage of beds, while the Covid-19 quarantine facilities were overwhelmed with patients.
He also called on the people of Sabah, Chinese community especially, to continue to remain vigilant and to fully comply with the SOPs while getting on with their lives.
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