Malaysia sees first Omicron case in South African student from Singapore: Khairy

KUALA LUMPUR – Malaysia has detected its first case of the Omicron variant in a 19-year-old South African student that arrived from Singapore on November 19.

According to Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin, the student was issued a mandatory quarantine order and did not exhibit any symptoms throughout.

In a tweet, he said that the case is a student, legitimately studying in Malaysia, who came back after visiting family in South Africa.

“Complied with pre-departure testing, on-arrival testing, fully vaccinated, stayed home during quarantine. Let’s be measured in our comments & reaction,” he said. – The Vibes, December 3, 2021

The Omicron case is a student, legitimately studying in Malaysia, coming back after visiting family in South Africa. Complied with pre-departure testing, on-arrival testing, fully vaccinated, stayed home during quarantine. Let’s be measured in our comments & reaction. https://t.co/YWDkfA5LEq

— Khairy Jamaluddin ??? (@Khairykj) December 3, 2021

Khairy said that the student entered Malaysia on November 19, before South Africa reported the first detected case of Omicron to the World Health Organisation.

“After we found out about Omicron, we went back to do genomic tests on all positive cases from KLIA between November 11 and 28 to see if it is already here. That’s how we detected the case,” he said.

Khairy reminded the public that new Covid-19 variants are inevitable, and the important thing is to “have robust measures and systems in place to detect, trace, and contain”. 

“On top of that, we must continue to follow standard operating procedures, get vaccinated and get the booster.”

Foreign arrivals from southern African countries frozen

Khairy also announced that the government has decided to temporarily bar travellers from several southern African countries as a preventive measure to tackle the variant.

The government had on November 26 decided to put a freeze on foreign arrivals from South Africa, Botswana, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, and Zimbabwe. Malawi was added to the list today.

Malaysian citizens and permanent residents, holders of Malaysia My Second Home passes, and those with spouse visas who have travelled to the listed high-risk countries in the last 14 days are exempted.

They have to be quarantined for 14 days at designated quarantine stations whether they have had their Covid-19 vaccinations or not.

“They have to undergo RTK-Ag tests 32 hours before arriving in Malaysia,” he said.

“The government has also barred Malaysians from travelling to countries listed as being high-risk for the Omicron variant,” he said.

Also present at the press conference was Health Director-General Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah.

Khairy said that travellers on the Vaccinated Travel Lane (VTL) from Singapore by air or land need to undergo Covid-19 tests on the third and seventh days after arrival. The results have to be uploaded on the MySejahtera app.

The Health Ministry will update the list of high-risk countries with the Omicron variant on a daily basis.

The ministry will evaluate a country on issues like the variant’s spread within communities or vaccination status before adding it to the high-risk list.

Khairy said the variant is vigorous compared to other Covid-19 variants, and moves fast into the body’s cells, especially for vulnerable people such as senior citizens.

He advised senior citizens who have had the Sinovac vaccine to register for Pfizer vaccines as the immunity provided by Sinovac decreases soon. – The Vibes, December 3, 2021