Dr Chin Zin Hing
KUCHING: Sarawak is able to test a maximum of 1,576 samples a day at five medical facilities, said state Health Department director Dr Chin Zin Hing.
He said that aside from the Sarawak General Hospital (SGH), there were laboratories capable of Covid-19 testing at the Sarawak Heart Centre, Sibu Hospital, Miri Hospital and Bintulu Hospital.
“Our laboratories have a maximum testing capacity of 1,576 tests a day and to reach this maximum capacity, we need to run two to three shifts or even work 24-hours.
“However, presently we are not maxing out our capacity yet,” he said in a press conference today on the daily Covid-19 update in Sarawak.
Dr Chin noted that the Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (Unimas) Institute of Health and Community Medicine laboratory was still assisting the state government in running Covid-19 tests.
“Unimas was engaged by the State Disaster Management Committee (SDMC) to help in the testing of Covid-19 and they have helped significantly during the outbreak.
“The Unimas lab is not closed, but it just depends on whether or not we send the tests to them. Since at present we are not maxing out testing capacity, the number of tests sent to the Unimas lab varies,” he added.