Bintulu wedding source of new cluster in Sarawak

KUCHING: A wedding ceremony in Kampung Jepak, Bintulu, has resulted in a new Covid-19 cluster, which comes as Sarawak reported 489 new cases and five deaths on Wednesday (April 14).

The state disaster management committee said the index case of the Jepak cluster was a woman from the village who organised the "doa selamat" ceremony for the wedding on April 3.

She tested positive on April 7 after undergoing screening for symptomatic individuals at the Bintulu health clinic.

"About 70 people attended the ceremony. After screening of close contacts, family members and casual contacts of the index case and those present at the ceremony, another 41 positive cases were detected," the committee said in a statement on Wednesday.

It said 102 people had been screened from the cluster, with 36 testing negative and 24 still awaiting results.

The committee also said new cases were detected in the Tembok Sri Aman prison cluster and Jalan Puncak Borneo police training centre cluster, contributing to the state's high number of cases.

"A total of 47 cases are involved the Jalan Puncak Borneo cluster. They are all close contacts who have been quarantined and there is no evidence that the infection has spread to the community.

"The Tembok Sri Aman cluster reported 76 new cases from the second round of tests. This cluster is under control in the prison and steps have been taken to prevent it from spreading to the community," the committee said.

Of the five fatalities, it said two patients died at Sarikei Hospital, two at Bintulu Hospital and one at the Sarawak General Hospital here.

The state's tally of confirmed cases now stands at 21,448 with 133 deaths.