TWO of the four new Covid-19 clusters announced today are linked to two travellers who tested negative for the coronavirus upon arrival at the Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA).

One of them was a Malaysian returning from Nigeria on July 11 and the other a foreigner from India who arrived on July 6 on business, director-general of health Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said in a statement today.

The Malaysian was the index case in the Pitakwa cluster in Kuala Terengganu and the foreigner, the Shirala cluster in Kuala Lumpur.

Both of the travellers had tested positive for Covid-19 when they fell sick days after arrival. They are currently receiving treatment.

Noor Hisham said yesterday that the antigen rapid test kits used at the entry points were not 100% accurate but were nonetheless employed because they were faster and cheaper than other tests.

In the Pitakwa cluster. 44 close contacts were identified for screening, two of whom tested positive and three, negative. The remainder are awaiting the test results.

Two close contacts were identified in the Shirala cluster. One of them tested postive for the virus.

Two other new outbreaks were identified as the Kuching Medical Centre cluster and Jupiter cluster. Both are in Sarawak.

Dr Noor Hisham today said the index case for the Kuching Medical Centre cluster was a local frontline healthcare worker, who is case 8734. The patient was screened, found to be infected and admitted to Sarawak General Hospital on July 14.

To date, 26 people have been identified as the healthcare worker’s close contacts, including the patient’s relatives and colleagues.

“One person among the 26 close contacts has tested positive. This is case 8,744 who was a colleague of the index case,” he said.

The index case in the Jupiter cluster, patient 8723, is a foreign crew member of a ship that had stopped in Singapore and Japan.

The patient began experiencing symptoms on July 3 and the symptoms got worse on July 11, when he was in Sarawak waters, Noor Hisham said. 

He was admitted to a medical centre where a test found him to be infected with the virus. He was then transferred to Hospital Bintulu.

Twenty-nine people – all crew members of the ship – were identified for as close contacts for screening.

Two of the group tested positive.

Noor Hisham said the Jupiter cluster was tagged as imported and isolated as the surrounding community had not been exposed to the ship crew. – July 17, 2020.