Do you remember my complaint about how we don't seem to get daily data on the number of tests (from Worldodometer). Refer to my posting of 10 June 2020.
We have another week of such missing data. I think what MOH said a day or two ago may explain this.
According to MOH, the govt had conducted 9,279 tests on 14 June but they don't have the total for the country as the private sector had yet to report in. I have a funny feeling that we now seem to be reporting weekly data due to backlog reporting by the private sector.
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Week No of equivalent tests per day
1 - 8 June 8,232
9 - 15 Jun 5,896
We are supposed to have the capacity to conduct 30,000 odd tests per day. Yet the data showed that we are only doing less than a 1/4 of the capacity.
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I am not sure whether to laugh or cry. I started 2 blogs in last month – this Covid blog and an investment blog i4value.asia.
The Covid one was actually started in mid-May but my son back-posted some of my earlier comments with my old school mates so that the first posting was dated 1 May.
The investment blog was started in the last week of May. Unlike the Covid blog which I post daily, the investment blog is meant to be a weekly posting (except for the first few which were posted together).
The strange thing is that although started later and with very less frequent posts, the investment blog today has doubled the number of daily page views c/w the Covid blog.
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This means that people are less interested in health and mortality c/w trying to make money. I am not sure whether this is a good sign for the country.
If you all want to know how hard it is to control the virus, just think of New Zealand. In my 7 Jun blog I mentioned then that they were close to eliminating the virus.
Last week they declared victory. But then yesterday after 3 1/2 weeks of no cases, they had 2 cases that were due to visitors from UK. Back to the drawing board.
So if NZ has to continue the war, we should not be any different. Think of the RMCO as a new phase of the Covid war.
We have to figure out how to control the spread given the additional mobility and the likelihood that there will be many places where social distancing is relaxed eg flying and public transport. Soon schools will be open and there will be an unknown source of infection for grandparents.
When I first started my comments (with my friends) way back in Mac, it was about trying to
- Guess the virus trajectory. Remember that the number of daily cases was going up daily
- Figure out whether the virus would overwhelm our medical capacity. Those were the days when you have the Governor of New York talking about them not having the ventilators.
- Figuring out when the MCO will end
Today my main concern is the risk of being infected as the reality is that
- We cannot always stay at home.
- We cannot avoid the foreign workers
- We cannot prevent our maid from going out forever
This is a new scenario and is very different from the MCO one where everyone is forced to stay at home.
The strange thing is that MOH has not changed the message. Theirs is still the general 3 C, 3 W, 3 S (see my 9 June post). Shouldn't this be modified to cater to the situation on the ground?
So let me start with some rules of thumb to minimize the risk of infection under this new phase.
1) If you are in a green zone, then I wouldn’t worry about the infection. Note that the green zone could change colour as the sick can travel inter-state and infect those in the green zone.
This zoning is also not helpful if you stay in the Klang Valley but if you are outside the Klang Valley, I think it is a pretty good indicator of safety.
I would go so far to say that if you are in this green zone, you can take a liberal attitude towards social distancing and wearing masks.
2) If you are not in a green zone
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Malaysiakini has a map showing the location of the cases in Malaysia. If you click on a button showing a specific location, it opens up a description of the case.
It is a helpful guide to know which specific building had Covid cases.
Unfortunately, I wish this could be screened to show only those for the past 3 weeks. There is no point to know that a particular building had Covid in Mac.
3) The biggest risk comes from contacts with asymptomatic cases. It would appear that we have contradictory advice from flying, taking public transport and getting a haircut.
With all the international discussions, I hope the authorities are finding out what other countries are doing rather than re-invent the wheel.
BTW, tf you have not seen the Youtube video, you should watch this one about this "long-distance" haircut.
4) Maid. During the MCO, it was simple enough as the maid could not go out. Now that there is no restriction on them moving about I am still not sure what to do
- I know my maid will wear a mask when she goes out
- But we don’t know who they meet. So we are trying to limit the places she goes to
- She will have to bath and change into new clothes when she comes home
Do any of you have better ideas?
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PS: This blog is for me to better understand COVID 19 as this will impact my investments. If you are also into equities, follow me at i4value.asia.
Disclaimer: I am not an epidemiologist, healthcare worker, pharmacist, or staff in the Ministry of Health, but rather is someone with a strong interest in numerical analysis. The content is an attempt to understand what is happening in the battle against COVID 19 from a data-based perspective. The opinions expressed here are based on information extracted from readily available public sources but I do not warrant its completeness or accuracy and should not be relied on as such.
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