TWO individuals have been categorised as close contacts of the index Omicron variant carrier, Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin said today.

He said contact tracing was done with the help of the airlines and involved passengers sitting near the index case.

“Contact tracing has been done with the help of the airlines. Our investigation found that the first four front rows, the back four rows and those on the left and right, only two have been categorised as close contact.

“The two are non-citizens and have tested negative for Covid-19 which was conducted upon arrival and before being released from quarantine,” he said at a press conference.

Khairy said contact tracing also included people who visited the duty-free shop, Eraman, and the food court at KLIA because the index patient had visited those places.

“We found that those who were there at the same time (as the index) patient have not been categorised as close contacts.

“My office will continue checking to ensure that there are no close contacts. We will flag some of them as casual contacts if the overlap was longer.”

The Health Ministry is also in the midst of determining at which point the index patient was infected, he added.

“The index patient did pre-departure and on-arrival testing, so we don’t know where she was infected.

“Her cycle threshold (CT) value was also high, meaning she was at the tail end of the infection. Our scientists are looking at what actually took place.”

Yesterday, Khairy said the first case of the Omicron Covid-19 variant had been detected in Malaysia.

The Omicron carrier is a 19-year-old non-citizen studying in Ipoh, Perak who is from South Africa, and who had entered the country through Singapore.

He said the student entered Malaysia on November 19 before the World Health Organization had declared Omicron a variant of concern on November 24.

Results of a second test also came back negative for the index patient and seven others, Health-Director General Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said yesterday.

As a control strategy, he said travellers arriving from high-risk countries at KLIA’s international gate will wear a digital tracker device throughout the quarantine period.

Meanwhile, the travel ban currently extends to eight African countries, namely South Africa, Botswana, Eswatini, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, Zimbabwe and Malawi will continue, he added. – December 4, 2021.