Do you know that in the top 100 countries in terms of the number of total Covid-19 cases, there are only 8 who have less than 50 cases from 1 Jul to 5 Jul ie less than 10 cases per day?
Malaysia made it to this list. Those on this list are
Ireland
Norway
Malaysia
Finland
Ethiopia
Hungary
Thailand
Somalia
What about the other places where the virus was supposedly under control?
Ranked 22 China – 72 cases
Ranked 63 South Korea – 241 cases
Ranked 72 Australia – 528 cases
Ranked 122 New Zealand – 5 cases
Ranked 155 Taiwan – 2 cases
Ranked 158 Vietnam – 0 cases
PS: The ranking refers to Worldodometer ranking in terms of the total number of cases with the US ranked as No 1
As you can see, popular names like China, South Korea and Australia are actually in the top 100 list whereas countries like New Zealand, Taiwan and Vietnam are not in the top 100.
So if a country is in the top 100 list, it is not so easy to be having less than 10 cases per day. Of course, if the country is outside the top 100 list, it may be easier.
If nothing else, I think MOH has done a good job.
FYI, Singapore is in the top 100 list and they are nowhere near in getting less than 10 cases per day.
So what is the risk to Malaysia in terms of being able to keep the numbers low?
The most obvious is the imported cases. The chart below shows the number of imported cases for the past 2 weeks. It does not look like the numbers from this source is going to go away.
And if we really open up the sky and allow more flights from other countries, I am sure the numbers will go up.
In case you missed the news, the recent increase in New Zealand and Australia is due to imported cases.
The more frightening one is Australia where I read one news report that said the spread was due to security guards (in the hotel where the in-coming travelers were quarantined) caught the virus because they shared a cigarette lighter.
If nothing else the Australian story shows the danger with any lax quarantine process.
In Malaysia, we are requiring incoming travelers to self-quarantine at home. I am not sure how effective this will be.
In my June 29 post I mentioned that from 10 Jun to 27 Jun, MOH has screened 6,609 individuals at KLIA. 6,573 were found negatives and told to self-quarantine at home. 36 found positives were hospitalized. It seems that police have conducted checks on 427 home quarantine cases and all complied with the SOP.
I don’t know what % of those quarantined the 427 cases represent. Even if I take the worst-case scenario of 4 per family, the 6,573 is equivalent o 1,643 families or homes.
If so, the 427 is just about 1/4 of those quarantined.
It is good that all the 427 were found to have complied with the SOP. But are we so confident that we can have 100% compliance?
All we need is one or two bad apples and we will have a spike.
I have read stories about how in China, the checking of those self-quarantined are so stringent with daily monitoring, etc
I think this is one area that we need the govt to look into more seriously.
We don't want to have done so well in controlling the spread that we get screwed up over some quarantine lapses.
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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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