PUTRAJAYA: The Health Ministry has projected that Malaysia will record 6,000 positive Covid-19 cases in the coming week.
This will surpass the earlier forecast of 5,000 cases within a two-week period by experts from Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM), said Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah.
He said this was due to enhanced public health intervention in the field.
"The university had expected 5,000 cases, but we projected 6,000 cases. Even with 800 to 900 cases being reported every day, we will exceed the earlier figures.
"We managed to bring the R-naught (R0) from 2.2 to 1.0 in more than a two-week period, so we can further bring the infectivity rate to 0.5 in another two to three weeks.
"We can break the chain of infection with cooperation from the people by staying at home and observing the SOPs when they need to go out," he said during his daily press conference, here, today.
Dr Noor Hisham was asked to comment on the report by USM experts, that a spike of 5,000 active Covid-19 cases will happen within a two-week period, as well as an increase in deaths.
Malaysia currently has 10,339 active cases, and a cumulative death toll of 271 deaths.