PRIVATE hospitals will soon be able to start treating less severe Covid-19 patients in Categories 1,2 and 3, said director-general of health Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah.

He told The Malaysian Insight that private hospitals can accept such cases without referring them to the Health Ministry’s (MOH) facilities.

This is among the arrangements made between Putrajaya and private hospitals following a high-level discussion on Saturday.

There are five categories of Covid-19 infections: 1 is positive cases with no symptoms, 2 is positive cases with mild symptoms, 3 is positive cases with pneumonia, 4 is pneumonia cases that require oxygen and 5 is for cases that require breathing assistance.

“We will study the capacity of private hospitals to manage patients in Categories 1,2 and 3 in private hospitals instead of in PKRC (low-risk treatment and quarantine centres) or MAEPS (Malaysia Agro Exposition Park in Serdang),” he said.

This will include expatriates and those in the business communities.

Noor Hisham said MOH will also continue sending non-Covid-19 patients to private hospitals.

On the timeline of implementation and billing procedures, he said an announcement will be made soon.

“We will announce the flow, framework and work process soon,” he said.

Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin announced last night that decanting patients to private hospitals will reduce the pressure on public hospitals and the heavily burdened health workers.

“For a start, the finance minister, the director-general of health and other senior government officials have held a discussion with senior management of private hospitals, owned by GLC’s (government-linked companies),  to kick start the decanting initiative,” Muhyiddin said in a statement.

Muhyiddin also said Noor Hisham held another discussion yesterday with senior management of other private hospitals via video call and attended by almost 400 participants to start implementing the initiative.

“I am touched by the prompt support we have received from the private hospitals,” the prime minister added.

Muhyiddin had declared a state of emergency last week where the private healthcare sector can be co-opted in the fight against the Covid-19 pandemic.

“In this context, some of the emergency ordinances can cover issues such as the use of private hospitals, temporary takeover of land, buildings and other properties owned by private hospitals or request the use of private hospital resources to treat Covid-19 patients,” he said in his national address.

This would enable the government to get more inclusive involvement from the private sector, including its faculties, to lighten the load undertaken by the government, particularly public hospitals. – January 18, 2021.