Sabah hospital beds virtually full

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Masidi

KOTA KINABALU: The hospital beds in Sabah are now almost fully occupied, or 99.5 per cent full, and this has forced the State Government to decide which Covid-19 patients to be admitted to its medical facilities for treatment and who should self-isolate.

Right now, priority for hospitalisation is given to those considered to have a higher chance of infecting others unless warded, said Datuk Seri Masidi Manjun, who is the state’s official Covid-19 spokesperson.

“If the symptoms are manageable, the patients will be advised to stay at home, and treatment will be done at home in order to save them from going to a quarantine or treatment centre,” Masidi said in his daily briefing yesterday.

“The idea is to ensure they will not infect others. This works well in cases where two people who live together and are both infected, they can quarantine themselves. Then the hospital will provide arrangements to be treated at home if the case is considered to still be in its early stages,” he added.

Masidi said hospitals in the state are doing their best and are conducting screenings to determine the severity of the patient’s symptoms to decide who to admit and who should be treated at home.

Out of the 5,651 beds in hospitals and Covid-19 quarantine and treatment centres available in Sabah, 5,624 or 99.5 per cent have been filled in the 23 low risk treatment and quarantine centres.

Some patients who exhibit little to no symptoms have been told to self-isolate at home for up to 10 days before they are called in to the treatment centres.

Earlier, Masidi said the cumulative number of cases in Sabah now is 9,868 with 5,624 active cases.

It is not known how many Covid-19 positive patients are waiting to be admitted into the treatment centres.