Leader

NST Leader: The invisible enemy

MANY may have missed this. Malaysia's Covid-19 infectivity rate or R-naught (RO) has crossed the critical mark of 1.6, presently settling at 1.72. This should raise alarms. And it did.

On Tuesday, Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah warned as much. Be informed, Malaysia is in worrying territory. In the Health Ministry's assessment, the R-naught jump could be due to community transmission or non-compliance of standard operating procedures. Either is troubling.

Let's take community transmission first. According to virologist Dr Sazaly Abu Bakar, who spoke to the New Straits Times on Thursday, asymptomatic hosts of the virus may be flaring up the clusters in Kedah. They may be flaring up clusters elsewhere, too. Virologists have long labelled asymptomatic hosts "ticking time bombs". And understandably so. They are all wired up with the virus like suicide bombers.

The only difference is the asymptomatic hosts do not know they are carrying a bomb around. Nor do the people they come into contact with. This makes them all the more dangerous. There is plenty of medical literature that suggests that a proportion of those who are infected with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2, or SARS-CoV-2, has what the profession calls "detectable viral loads" before showing symptoms.

Or worse still, without ever developing symptoms. One such is written by Dr Susan Lee of the Royal Columbian Hospital, Canada, and others as part of the Public Health Emergency Covid-19 Initiative.

Dr Sazaly thinks these unidentified "enemies" may be the source of the second or third wave. Our fear is, he may be right. This is why it is important for all to wear surgical masks.

Studies have shown that droplets and aerosol particles exhaled by the infected drop to zero when they don such face masks.

There is yet another thing that is beginning to be troubling. Some health workers and other frontliners are either giving the SOPs a slip or are being lax about adhering to them.

A tragic result of this is the recent case of a medical officer infecting seven members of his family. If those who are supposed to protect us cannot protect themselves, then we have good grounds to worry.

Worry you will when you make the hospital visits. Here and there, hospital staff give the SOPs the slip.

A substantial some do not wear face masks. Others who do, wear them exposing their nose, room enough for droplets and aerosol particles to be exhaled or inhaled. Patients and visitors, seeing this, mimic them.

Health workers, of all people, should know that there is compelling evidence favouring the use of surgical masks. As for the man-in-the-Rapid bus, there is still a sizeable number who see the SOPs as something to be breached.

If proof is needed, just consider the 221 errant Malaysians who were detained on Tuesday for breaching the SOPs. Many more may be getting away undetected. The results are telling.

Yesterday, Covid-19 cases have gone back to three digits. Malaysia was supposed to be free of Covid-19 cases in mid-August, or at the latest, by end of August.

In three days, we will be midway into September. We cannot allow our hard-fought fight against Covid-19 to come to nought like this.

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