We have a Covid 19 pattern that researchers have earlier forecasted

We had 277 new cases yesterday with 270 cases from the detention centre.  OK, the majority are not only foreigners but are also in a "confined area". 

For you and me, the risk comes from community spread ie those sick walking about freely.  It does not come from those in the "confined area" since we don't have any business to go there.

So DON’T PANIC

In the history of COVID 19 in Malaysia, there are two types of "confined area"

• those established during the infection period eg quarantine centre, EMCO area

• those that were established a long time ago to restrict the movements of certain groups of people eg jail, detention centre

So when the infection spread within a "confined area", the majority of the cases will, of course,  be members of the "confined community".  Members in this context refer not only to those confined by the authorities but also to the staff working there and possibly the visitors.

I think we should give our thumbs up to MOH for having a track record of not letting the number of cases within the "confined area" spread to you and me.

This is not to say that it cannot spread out from the "confined area" since the staff and visitors are able to move out of the "confined area".  But there would be SOP and other measures to minimize this.

So don't' worry about the 277 cases spike. Afterall I had in my posts of the past few days prepared you for the spike. 

Go and look up my 9 May and 1 June posts.

We had expected this given: 

• The propensity for cases to spread within the old clusters. Ha! Reflects slow contact tracing

• The number of people still waiting for the test results eg prison.  Not MOH fault since this is a feature of the PCR test.  We could use the Rapid Test Kit but somehow this is reserved for some yet-to-be-announced purpose.  MOH did previously said it was to be sent to Sabah and Sarawak since their PCR test had to be sent to the labs in Peninsular.  But now that these states have their own lab, this transportation constraint is no longer there. 

• The “spontaneous” new cases.  OK, I am being facetious, but it is intended to show that there is much that we still don't know about how the virus is transmitted.  

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I came across an article by the  Business Insider.com (refer to Note 1) some time back about the future of the virus.  At that time, I did not give it too much attention as it was American-centric, but given the new pattern of cases in Malaysia, I thought it might be relevant now.

According to the article, researches in the US forecast that the pandemic will last 18 to 24 months with 3 scenarios which Business Insider illustrated as follows:

Peak and Valley – the current wave will recede and then to come back with the same magnitude over the next 1 to 2 years. 

Fall peak – The current peak will recede over summer (remember that this is the US) and then come back with a more severe peak.  This is like the Spanish Flu of 1918 – 1919.  

Slow burn – after the current peak, there will be smaller waves.  

BTW, the pictures are illustrative and it does not mean that there are different numbers of cases in each of the current peaks under the 3 scenarios.

While we may argue about how high our peak is c/w the US, I think the 3 scenarios are also applicable to us. 

I want you to now take a look at the pattern of the number of daily new cases in Malaysia as below where I have also superimposed the 7-days moving average line.  

The 7-days moving average line smoothed out much of the daily noise, so you can see that we have a major peak followed by a few smaller ones.  BTW the 7-days moving ave will not have captured the full impact of yesterday 277 cases or else we will see a higher peak for the 1st week of June period. 

You get to choose the wave pattern for Malaysia in comparison with the 3 scenarios

We can draw the following conclusion about the virus pattern in the country

• It is not going to zero any time soon
• There are repeated "up and down" 
• There are black swan daily numbers - yesterday was the highest we ever got

Sad to say, what the US researchers said are already coming true in Malaysia now. No need to wait till after "summer". 

What do I think is the appropriate scenario?

WE ARE IN THE SLOW BURN TERRITORY

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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

Note
Business Insider actually summarized an article that appeared in the Stat News. You can follow the article yourself if you want to. 

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.