The
Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases (Declaration of Infected Local Areas) Order 2020 [P.U.(A) 87/2020] (“
Infected Local Areas Order”), whereby all States and Federal Territories of Malaysia were declared as infected areas of the Covid-19 virus for the initial period 18 March 2020 to 31 March 2020, is further extended for the period 1 July 2024 to 31 December 2024 with the coming into force of the
Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases (Declaration of Infected Local Areas) (Extension of Operation) Order 2024 [P.U.(A) 179/2024] on 1 July 2024.
This is the 15
th time the operation of the Infected Local Areas Order has been extended. The Infected Local Areas Order was gazetted on 17 March 2020 in light of the implementation of the country’s first movement control order on 18 March 2020 to control the spread of the Covid-19 virus.
The Minister of Health, Datuk Seri Dr, Dzulkefly Ahmad, announced on 29 June 2024 that the Ministry of Health will release details of the revised standard operating procedure (“
SOP”) soon. The Minister of Health said that the revised SOP may see changes to the home surveillance order (HSO), use of face masks and the declaration of local areas of infection. According to Dr. Dzulkefly, “
It is now an era where we start treating Covid-19 like other viruses such as influenza. We used to move from a pandemic to an endemic, now we want to get out of an endemic transition to living with the virus.”
1
To recap, Malaysia transitioned from an epidemic phase to an endemic phase on 1 April 2022.
2 It will be interesting to see the changes that will be introduced under the revised SOP.
Alert prepared by Tan Wei Liang (Senior Associate) of Skrine.