KUCHING (Apr 4): The State Health Department declared three new Covid-19 clusters today, said State Disaster Management Committee (SDMC) chairman Datuk Amar Douglas Uggah at a press conference today.
Uggah, who is also Deputy Chief Minister, said the clusters dubbed Tembok Cluster, Sungai Mupong and Sungai Rassau were detected in Sri Aman, Meradong, and Matu respectively.
With 159 positive cases detected from the Tembok Cluster, he said that this contributed to the increase in the number of cases detected in Sarawak today as it was detected at Sri Aman detention centre.
The Sungai Mupong cluster in Meradong recorded nine cases, while the Sungai Rassau cluster in Matu recorded two cases.
At the press conference, Uggah said that since early this year, most positive cases in the state were detected from social gatherings.
From January, he said there are 59 clusters that involve social gatherings – where 40 fatalities were recorded and 7,305 individuals out of 71, 545 screened were found positive.
He added that among the highest number of positive cases recorded were mostly detected from those attending funeral services – where eight clusters were declared. Out of a total 46, 856 individuals screened, 3,595 were found positive, leading to 30 deaths.
“Other social gatherings such as wedding ceremony, festivities, gotong-royong, anniversaries, farewell parties and cock-fighting have led to the declaration of 32 clusters, with 1,928 individuals were found positive, leading to five deaths.
“As such, SDMC wish to stress again that although it is hard to avoid social gathering after it has not been done for so long, think about the consequences,” he advised.
Meanwhile, Uggah said the State Health Department declared an end to the Jalan Ho Pin cluster in Samarahan district as no new case were recorded in the past 28 days.
“As of today, there are 39 clusters that are still active – out of which 11 of them recorded additional cases today. The remaining 28 clusters did not record any new cases,” he added.