8 August 2021 fills us with both horror and sorrow by reminding us of the huge cost suffered by Malaysians in fighting this losing battle against COVID-19 with the highest number of COVID-19 daily deaths on record at 360. DAP expresses deepest condolences to the grieving families of the total 10,749 deaths so far.
With a record daily death of 360 yesterday, the number of cases in ICU and requiring breathing assistance should have declined significantly. What is ominous is that the number of ICU cases remain almost unchanged at 1,095 and those requiring intubation from ventilators at 571 on 8 August as compared to 1,097 and 575 respectively on 7 August. This disturbing statistic shows that there is still no light at the end of the tunnel.
There are still many public complaints of unavailability and inaccessibility of ICU beds whether at public or private hospitals, particularly in the Klang Valley. Is the government doing anything about this? There is no redeeming quality about this failed government when not a single leader has resigned nor there is any concrete plan to overcome the record number of deaths and infections that hit a total 1,262,540 on 8 August.
Yesterday Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin did not respond to how the government will respond to the 360 record daily deaths but announced a series of restrictions-easing for fully vaccinated individuals. The easing of restrictions is intended to help aid the country’s economic activity but will not work without urgently needed additional RM45 billion fund injection. This is no different from asking a person with broken legs to move forward without a wheelchair.
The easing of restrictions should also be accompanied by stringent preventive measures, especially mass screening to test all close contacts of COVID-19 positive cases. The proposed additional RM45 billion fund injection would also include RM4 billion for health support system, more ICU beds, ramping up the National Immunisation Programme(PICK) and large scale implementation of the Find, Test, Trace, Isolate and Support plus vaccination (FTTIS+V).
The positivity rate has spiked up to a high of 13.1% for the week of 1-6 August, almost triple the recommended level of 5% by the World Health Organisation(WHO). This shows that there is insufficient testing and that the mass screening exercise must be expanded to at least 1% of the population or 320,000 tests daily. The WHO recommends FTTIS+V as one the preventive measures against mass outbreaks in the future. Herd immunity should be achieved solely through inoculation, not by both infection and inoculation.
Aiding economic activity cannot operate in isolation or silos by relying only on easing restrictions of those fully vaccinated. There must be a whole of society effort requiring whole of government financial assistance. One of the principal reasons for the failure of PN government’s 8 stimulus packages amounting to RM530 billion to pull the country out of the economic recession, is that the direct cash aid was too low at RM83 billion when compared to economic losses of more than RM500 billion.
For this reason, the government must take bold steps to waive interest on the 6 month automatic bank loan moratorium for all borrowers(except Top 10). Welfare assistance must be increased to RM1,000 monthly, including the unemployed which will cost RM1 billion per month. RM6 billion must be allocated to offer wage and hiring incentives to create 300,000 new jobs to reduce the unemployment rate. Businesses must be given RM30 billion in grants, monetary incentives, wage, rent and utility subsidies instead of loans and guarantees, to save jobs and slow business closures.
Mahiaddin Md Yassin should take the opportunity to do something constructive for the rakyat even though he has no legitimacy to remain as Prime Minister following the loss of his parliamentary majority. Pumping an additional RM45 billion for the rakyat will bring him better political dividends than trying to “buy” support from individual MPs with positions or posts.