Employers Risk Closure if They Do Not Allow Workers to Quarantine

According to Health Minister Datuk Dr Adham Baba, employers who do not allow their workers to self-quarantine while waiting for Covid-19 screening test results will have their premises closed down immediately. 

The minister said that the action comes under the conditions of the General Standard Operation Procedures and the General Guidelines on the Approval of Operations Movement of Company Employees during movement control order (MCO) released by the International Trade and Industry Ministry (Miti).

He said the condition also applied to workers who voluntarily quarantine themselves after receiving negative results for Covid-19.

"If employers disallow allow quarantines, the condition states that the police and the Health Ministry can order the immediate closure of their premises based on the authority given.

"Non-compliance by employers must be reported to the police," Dr Adham said at a media conference.

The Prime Minister announced the third nationwide MCO on May 10.

Article 34

Article 34 of the condition states that if there are any workers under the Health Ministry's observation or placed under home observation, the worker cannot return to work and needs to undergo a quarantine period set by the ministry.

The condition also says that the employer must help and cooperate fully with the ministry in performing contact tracing of employees infected with Covid-19 and contact management. The employee under observation by the ministry or under home observation is not allowed to work and must undergo quarantine.

Dr Adham said the reminder was appropriate after the recent increase in workplace-linked Covid-19 clusters, with 44 clusters reported between May 2 and May 8, compared to 24 clusters from April 25 to May 1.

The minister said the situation is disturbing as it depicts an 83.3% increase during that period.

He said there also was a surge in Covid-19 deaths recorded in six weeks, with:

• 22 deaths registered from March 21-27; 
• 35 cases each from March 28-April 3 and April 4-10; 
• 49 cases from April 11-17; 
• 56 cases from April 18-24 and 
• 95 cases from April 25-May 1.

He said that the ministry recorded a total of 1,657 deaths with a 0.38% rate as of May 8.

Dr Adham said 9.98 million persons had undergone Covid-19 RT-PCR tests as of May 8.

He added that the ministry conducted 498,193 tests from May 2-8 compared to 480,688 tests from April 25-May 1, and the rate of persons testing positive from May 2-8 is 5.1%.

Source: Malay Mail

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