KOTA KINABALU: Sabah recorded 29 new positive Covid-19 cases, the lowest since September 2020, but another 872 pending screening samples from Nabawan might push up the rate in the future
“According to the report of Sabah State Health Department, the number of new Covid-19 positive cases today are 29 cases. If you add this to the previous number of cases, the cumulative total are 53,932 cases, and, thank god, no deaths were recorded today,” he said during the Sabah State Covid-19 Current Development Press Conference here today.
“We have found that 20 districts have not recorded any new cases in a period of 24 hours. In Kota Kinabalu itself, which usually displays quite high statistics, only one case was recorded in the past 24 hours.
“This shows that if we all adhere to the rules and also the enforced SOPs, we will see good results and outcome. And if we fail or are complacent with the usage or compliance of SOP, then we will find the probability for the occurrence of virus spread,” he added.
Masidi said the government had previously implemented the Movement Control Order (MCO) in Nabawan district, which was scheduled to end on March 16.
“To date, the Ministry of Health (MOH) has conducted 3,079 screening tests and, out of that total, a cumulative 279 cases have been recorded,” he said.
“However, MOH confirmed there are still a remaining 872 screening samples that are pending results.
“After making a risk assesment with various agencies in the MCO Technical Committee and on the advice of MOH, the state government agreed to extend the MCO period in Nabawan District for another 14 days from March 17 to March 30, 2021, in line with the federal government’s decision,” he added.
Masidi, also Local Government and Housing Minister and Finance Minister II, said a total of 126 Covid-19 patients have been discharged or recovered from the hospital, taking the cumulative recovery total to 52,995.
He said a total of 447 patients are receiving treatment, namely 177 in the hospitals and 269 at the public Covid Quarantine and Low-risk Treatment Centres (PKRC) and one at the Temporary Detention Centre (PTS) or prison.
He added 21 Covid-19 patients are in the Intensive Care Unit and five people require ventilators.
Masidi said Nabawan recorded 11 new Covid-19 positive cases, the highest number in Sabah today, followed by Tawau (seven), Kalabakan (six), Keningau (two), Kota Kinabalu (one), Sipitang (one) an Tambunan (one).
He said no new cases were found in Penampang, Kota Belud, Kinabatangan, Lahad Datu, Telupid, Sandakan, Putatan, Papar, Beluran, Ranau, Kudat, Kunak, Kota Marudu, Tuaran, Tenom, Pitas, Kuala Penyu, Semporna, Beaufort and Tongod.
He added no new clusters were reported, and the Putatan, Kunak and Papar districts changed from orange to yellow zone whilst the Sandakan district changed from red to orange zone.
Masidi said of the 29 Covid-19 positive cases today, a total of 14 cases were from close contact screening, five cases from symptomatic screening, nine cases from existing cluster screening, and one case was from other categories.