The Covid-19 Quarantine and Treatment Centre (PKRC) at the Malaysia Agro Exposition Park Serdang (MAEPS) will be reopened after being closed down on 8 February.
According to Bernama, Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin said this move is to help ease the burden of overcrowded hospitals with cases involving patients with mild symptoms.
This comes after the surge in Covid-19 cases in the country, where he said that there is currently a high number of hospital admissions involving COVID-19 patients who do not require treatment in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) and intensive care.
“For example, Kuala Lumpur Hospital has improved services for non-Covid-19 cases. So we do not want all (Covid-19 cases) to refer to HKL and causing it to become overcrowded.”
“Secondly, we see patients who came to the hospital to seek treatment for other diseases but tested positive for coronavirus after undergoing screenings,” he said this after the opening and visiting Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) complex on 25 February.
Khairy said the isolation of patients at MAEPS would reduce the burden of hospitals and ensure they are not overcrowded and had the flexibility to manage beds.
In addition, he said that the reopening of MAEPS was a pre-emptive move given rising Covid-19 cases.
Khairy then stressed that it was necessary as high-risk COVID-19 patients under categories 1 and 2 were also being admitted to hospitals as pre-emptive measures.
“This decision was taken as the number of cases were high, and if necessary, such high-risk patients can be treated through early intervention. Hospitals could focus on patients in categories 3 to 5 and also not disrupt the treatment of non-COVID-19 cases,” he said.
Meanwhile, he said only 10 to 15% of former Covid-19 patients had ‘long COVID’ complications with most of them being at risk.
“We have a protocol for treating long Covid, especially through our rehabilitative care. I have asked that we further improve rehabilitation treatment for prolonged Covid-19. So we are paying close attention to long Covid cases, especially those involving high-risk categories,” he said.
 at the Malaysia Agro Exposition Park Serdang (MAEPS) will be reopened after being closed down on 8 February.){kind=link}