PETALING JAYA, Jan 21 (Sin Chew Daily) –The Malaysian Medical Association (MMA) president Prof Datuk Dr M Subramaniam said with the staggering daily new COVID-19 infection numbers in the country at this moment, he believes the government's contact tracking system may have been overburdened and the situation could become very bad if this problem is not addressed immediately.

"Take the 4,008 new positive cases reported yesterday for instance, if each patient has been in close contact with five other people, the health ministry may have to track more than 20,00 people a day."

Dr Subramaniam said during a telephone interview with Sin Chew Daily that things could go out of control if the government fails to track the close contacts.

He also said tracking does not require specific training or expertise and any healthcare worker could do it, including general practitioners.

He said now that the government had set aside bigger allocations for healthcare, the money could be used to hire people to track the close contacts of COVID-19 patients.

He proposed that the health ministry enlist the help of private practitioners to track the contacts, adding that there are some 8,000 to 10,000 private practitioners in the country who can help track the contacts.

However, before enlisting private hospitals to treat COVID-19 cases, the government must make sure they have sufficient space, capacity, trained manpower and equipment to do so.

Meanwhile, the Association Of Private Hospitals Malaysia (APHM) president Datuk Dr Kuljit Singh told Sin Chew Daily during a telephone interview that the health ministry had provided COVID-19 training for healthcare personnel at private hospitals through a virtual meeting. However, he admitted that most private hospitals do not have the manpower to help track close contacts of COVID-19 patients.

"We also can't take in large numbers of patients, Some private hospitals only have two to three ICU beds each. Only larger ones have more."

To help reduce the load of government hospitals, Dr Kuljit Singh said private hospitals are nevertheless prepared to take in non-Covid patients referred by the health ministry.