CORONAVIRUS | Health Ministry director-general Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said Malaysia is currently moving towards the fourth phase - mitigation - for Covid-19.

The phases are listed according to the increasing severity of a particular disease outbreak, starting with the onset phase, the (early) containment phase, the late containment phase and finally, the mitigation phase.

“We are moving towards phase four that is actually mitigation so it is very important for us to make sure that this is a small window of opportunity for us to break the transmission of the virus in the community.

“Therefore, we are using Act 342, the Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases Act, and with this act and the movement control order (MCO)... basically we are trying to restrict the movement of individuals.

“If we can do that, then there is no public gathering, there is no opportunity for the virus to transmit from one individual to another,” he said in a press conference at the Health Ministry headquarters in Putrajaya today.

On March 15, Health Minister Dr Adham Baba had said Malaysia was in the late containment stage.

Just three days before that, he had said Malaysia was still in the early containment phase.

Hisham today announced that there were 123 new positive cases of Covid-19 as of 12pm today, making it a total of 1,306 cases. 

There were also two new deaths related to Covid-19 today, bringing the total death count to 10.

Keep up with the latest information on the outbreak in the country with Malaysiakini's free Covid-19 tracker.