An Insightful A(H1N1) Commentary

The following commentary was recently made by an astute journalist.
I'm impressed and would love to join in the fray and share constructive opinions about the state of current affairs in Malaysia as well.

I hope Malaysians will kick the "tidak apa" attitude and act fast at all times before everything shuts down with a pandemic that goes "amok".

Whose fault is it that leads to the high mortality?

(By LIM SUE GOAN/Translated by SOONG PHUI JEE/Sin Chew Daily)
2009-08-13 14:13

The influenza A (H1N1) mortality rate in Malaysia is close to 2% instead of the 0.1% to 0.4% as estimated by the Health Ministry. It reflects an unusual phenomenon. Without finding out the crux of the problem, assuming that 5 million of people are infected, probably 100,000 of them will die, instead of 5,000 to 28,000 as estimated by the World Health Organization (WHO).

If we compare to other countries, we can see the inadequacy of prevention and control in Malaysia. Vietnam reported 1211 confirmed cases with one death and the mortality rate of 0.08%. While Hong Kong reported 5991 confirmed cases with four deaths and the mortality rate
of 0.067%. Australia reported 27,663 confirmed cases with 95 deaths and the mortality rate of 0.34%. Even Singapore that found death cases earlier than Malaysia, reported only nine deaths.

The Health Ministry believed that the domestic confirmed cases are far lesser than the announced amount, and said it should be multiply by 20 to get the correct data. But if we compare it to other countries calculated based on the announced confirmed cases, their rates are
still lower than ours.

"Many people complaint that government hospitals have been reacting too slow to the influenza..."

Why was our death toll increased to 44 people within three weeks after the first death case reported on 22 July? And why are we having over 200 new cases each day, causing the epidemic to fall out of control?

Such a high mortality rate might be caused by a variation of the virus, weak immune system of Malaysians, poor public health system and ability to deal with an emergency. The former two causes have very low probability. If there is a variation or a new virus, the Health Ministry would have recognized it through the autopsy reports. And no matter how weak is the Malaysians immune system, it would not have killed six to eight people every day. The key should be the public health system and the mobility of medical personnel.

Hong Kong, Japan and Australia no longer take the quarantine measures, but they are still having a low mortality rate because of their sound public health systems in which their medical personnel treat the high-risk patients first.

Many people complaint that government hospitals have been reacting too slow to the influenza, including spending a lot of time waiting for tests and long testing time. Many patients might have missed the golden time for treatment during the waiting period and died.

In addition, during the early stage, the government treated the epidemic with neglect, low efficiency and it did not see it as a serious infectious disease. If the government has held a large-scale awareness and hygiene campaign, including stopping assemblies, the
epidemic would not have lost control.

The people lost the sense of crisis because the government did not propagate it through the media at that time as they took into account the impact of it on the national economy, especially on tourism.

Such a serious epidemic has tested Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak's governing philosophy of "people first, performance now". The government must take urgent measures and emergency means, including having early school holiday and a general mobilisation of medical
resources, to prevent the spread of the influenza. Any hesitation will further push up the death toll.

Curses! Beware!

Curses are bad for one and one's health! One could suffer and even die if one is cursed! The most famous Chinese curse, arguably is: 'May you live in interesting times'. I'm not joking.

I once wrote about the US presidency curse which is evident in the deaths of so many presidents who were elected in a year ending with a zero. Eventually the curse was broken by Ronald Reagan when he survived the assassination attempt on him, holding the presidency for a number of more years.. For further discussion on this curse, please go back to my blog entry entitled "Max' Accurate Prediction'.

Here is a local one that Jeff Ooi of Screenshots has wryly observed as possibly the reason ministers who hold the Malaysian Health Ministry position of Health Minister end up leaving politics for good! Do note that this excerpt was made before the fast-rising charismatic political star, Health Minister Chua Soi Lek sex tape controversy erupted, eventually causing him to resign all political posts.

Minister of Health

The portfolio of Minister of Health is traditionally reserved for MCA.

However, past records show whoever that occupies the seat will come to the end of the road in politics.

Ng Cheng Kiat (1990), Lee Kim Sai (1995) and Chua Jui Meng (2004) are indisputable examples who are still alive. Whereas, Dr Ng Kam Poh (1969), Lee Siok Yew (1978), Chin Hon Ngian (1986), Mak Hon kam (1987) and Chan Siang Sun (1989) were older testimonies of similar fate, cast in stone.

Only Chong Hon Nyan managed to break the chain in 1984, when he retired as a short-stint Transport Minister after serving as the Minister of Health.

Let's see if Chua Soi Lek can break the curse this time.

Apparently, now we know that he couldn't do so.

The eyes are once again on the successor to the post...