SENIOR Minister for Defence Ismail Sabri Yaakob last week confirmed that condominium management bodies have the right to impose mandatory screening for tenants, later clarifying this was specifically meant for foreign workers.

First, it does not seem to follow any science or statistical data that foreign workers are more prone to either being infected or infecting others.

Second, the health ministry has already clarified that clusters involving foreign workers at factories have already moved into the community.

It is ironic that this message is being sent at the same time the government is working to dispel social stigma related to Covid-19, a stigma that it inadvertently helped create with the initial clamping down of Covid-19 from March to May 2020, where hospital quarantines were a norm for anyone who tested positive, as was two-week tagged quarantine for those who were contact-traced even if they tested negative.

Fast forward six months to today, in stark contrast, due to the multiple-fold case load increase contract tracing is much, much slower and, in many cases, may not occur at all.

Even people who test positive with non-severe symptoms are simply expected to home-quarantine.

Malaysia is facing, like many countries, a second (or third, by some counts) wave.

Like many others, it cannot afford to keep its economy locked down or risk losing even more jobs and businesses closing, on top of the estimated 100,000 people who have already lost their jobs, with much more on greatly reduced earning capacity in an increasingly crowded marketplace where more people are selling, and fewer and fewer buying.

The usual government window-dressed responses and covering up of missteps will not work to placate a pandemic-weary rakyat who have gone 320 days since ‘normal’.

Shifting goalposts and revolving narratives will only serve to worsen the pushback. When people get agitated to a point of not caring, all the sugar-coating in the world cannot salvage the effort and sacrifices put in to stabilise either the economic data or infection rate.

The front-liners, business owners, investors and voters alike deserve a transparent and competent answer.

The preventive steps need to make sense, especially after a protracted period of time, more than 300 days and counting. We should have learnt much by now and react based on what the latest data and research tells us.

For example, it was reported that up to 88% of the infected do not show any symptoms, and of those who did get it, some 30% did not suffer a fever.

Is temperature screening still relevant with those facts, and this late into the pandemic?

The majority of new infections, along with most of the new clusters, appear in workplaces and construction sites, but they remain open.

Meanwhile, the emphasis of the present MCO appears to be restaurants and interstate travel, but without too strict enforcement.

Instead, perhaps limiting contact regardless of industry, to WHO guidelines to less than 45 minutes, with face masks and social distancing of 1m, and limiting the number of people within the restaurants seem to make more sense.

Certain industries like hairdressers being subjected to different regulations than, say, a cosmetic dental procedure does not make sense.

Apart from strict enforcement at roadblocks and small businesses, ministries and agencies involved should instead take a closer look at construction sites and workplaces.

Strict guidelines for business owners need to urgently be made into regulation instead of recommendations – such as minimal number of workers, alternating working days, enforcing the work-from-home order, sanitising and quarantine procedures and so on.

Fines and penalties should be imposed and enforced, and the government needs to be logical, strict and unbiased in applying these, as targeting the public alone not only draws comparison against double standards to those with influence, but also does not seem to be helping to bring the numbers down.

It is time to be practical, straightforward and honest in dealing with the rakyat, or no number of lockdowns will be enough. – February 3, 2021.

* Emmanuel Joseph firmly believes that Klang is the best place on Earth, and that motivated people can do far more good than any leader with motive.

* This is the opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insight. Article may be edited for brevity and clarity.