THE Health Ministry is working to resolve the logistics issues to expedite the processing of Covid-19 test samples from Sabah, said its director-general Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah.

Sabah currently has the capacity to process between 2,500 and 3,000 test samples daily.

Some of the samples, however, are brought to the Peninsula for processing since the ministry has stepped up testing activities in the state which is now a virus hotbed.

“Now we are addressing the issue of logistics to bring some of the samples from Sabah to the Institute of Medical Research in the Peninsula and with the daily flights probably we can speed up the test (processing),” he said in a virtual presser today.

Noor Hisham said the ministry has set a benchmark of between 48 and 72 hours to complete the process.

Malaysia has stepped up its testing capacity by increasing the number of laboratories from 23 to 60. With this, the testing capacity has increased from 1,000 to 41,000 samples daily.

Noor Hisham said the ministry has utilised only 51% of its capacity. – October 9, 2020.