Govt is reopening all the wrong states

 

There are now Malaysians on hunger strike to demand better handling of the Covid-19 crisis. One thing they are calling for is for experts to become decision-makers.

Last Wednesday, one such highly respected public health policy expert Dr Amar Singh HSS published an article detailing his projections regarding the spread of Covid-19 outside the Klang Valley.

He listed five states as being the most vulnerable to Covid-19 - states which face the risk of becoming as bad or worse than the Klang Valley: Sabah, Kedah, Perak, Johor and Penang (he stated that things were less certain for Terengganu, Pahang and Kelantan - as their future will likely be determined by the future rate of vaccination).

The states currently listed as under Phase 2 and thus eligible for some reopening are Penang, Perak, Pahang, Terengganu, Kelantan and Sabah.

In Sabah, Perak and Penang especially (and very possibly in the remaining three states), we are looking at Klang Valley levels of disaster and deaths in a matter of weeks if the government stubbornly does the exact opposite of what experts are advising.

To summarise Singh’s points, he pointed out these five states as being particularly vulnerable because of their extremely low vaccination rates and weak hospital infrastructure. Needless to say, the Delta variant is also a game-changer.

These states are less vaccinated and have less infrastructure than the Klang Valley to deal with a surge in Covid-19 cases - a surge that is almost 100 percent guaranteed to happen in the light of these announcements to re-open.

Surely any reasonable, sane person can see that we are on the brink of an unmitigated national disaster.

I know that ‘thousands of deaths’ is a phrase that becomes increasingly meaningless the more I use it, but that is exactly the endpoint that awaits this course of action.

Doing exact opposite of what experts say

The government has not cited any public health experts who support their plan to open up these highly vulnerable Phase 2 states.

The Malaysian Medical Association and the Malaysian Health Coalition have both voiced their objections to the plan - precisely the health experts we should be listening to.

Meanwhile, restaurants in these states have already stated that even though they are allowed to open for dining-in, they are too wary to do so.

Once again, even the man in the street is smarter and more prudent than the government.

This betrays the most fundamental problem with our government: they make policies based on political and monetary interests instead of doing what is right for the rakyat.

This is also exactly why all our recent ‘lockdowns’ have involved all the costs, with none of the benefits. People are restricted from all sorts of activities, while factories are allowed to become super-spreaders, making our sacrifices become totally useless.

Perhaps the government is reopening these states to give the illusion that the Covid-19 situation is improving, when in fact, it is precisely those Phase 2 states that are on the verge of an unmitigated, life-threatening disaster.

It is hard to talk about the manner in which the government is playing dice with our lives for their own benefit without descending into a hyperbolic rage (it is these emotions that give rise to hunger strikes).

The fact that they are doing the exact opposite of what data and science demand, indicates that they are essentially signing our death warrants.

The government should hand all decision-making power with regards to Covid-19 policies to public health experts, or at the very least, take their advice unconditionally.

If they continually fail to do so, they should be replaced immediately with anyone - literally, anyone - who can and will do so. Our accelerating death numbers indicate that we are fast approaching the stage where we will need to append ‘by hook or by crook’ to that last sentence.

What do we do next?

We must dedicate all our efforts, at every level of society, to #SelesaiCovidDulu.

Hunger strikes and other mass actions are an effort to de-normalise what is happening in Malaysia, amidst unrelenting efforts by the government to normalise these deaths and abysmal management of the Covid-19 situation.

Well before India and Italy reached the numbers that we are seeing now, the world was losing its mind over the situation in those countries.

The biggest single reason the world hasn’t done so for Malaysia is that Malaysia practices a draconian culture of repression and silence with regard to information.

Most importantly, frontliners aren’t allowed to tell the truth about what is happening. If they could, Malaysians who could see the terrors that await Covid-19 patients would surely demand more drastic change.

As it is, the truth is suppressed, and our (by now) near-murderous leaders want us to smile and act as if everything is normal, just like they are doing.

We must resist. We must de-normalise.

There will likely be campaigns starting in the coming days to make this happen.

In the meantime, one thing every single Malaysian can do to help fight Covid-19 is to get themselves tested, preferably with self-test kits - this is our #UjiDiri. If you are positive, quarantine yourselves.

Experts have been telling us over and over that this alone, on a mass scale, would make the numbers plummet. The government must do their part to make this happen by guaranteeing low costs for self-test kits.

To summarise again, the government should be tightening restrictions (especially on factories - based on the mathematical models by Stanford mathematician Benjamin Lim) in Phase 2 states.

If there is to be any reopening at all, it is probably better to target the Greater Klang Valley in a few weeks simply because of the second dose vaccination rate it is likely to have achieved by then.

All our work must be guided by two simple principles: first, solving the Covid-19 crisis is the only thing that matters; second, lives are not numbers. - Mkini

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NATHANIEL TAN’s life was saved by his courageous hero, Gurpreet Singh. If you would like to save his life, do email nat@engage.my. #KuasaPuasa #BangsaMalaysia #BangkitBersama.

The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of MMKtT.