Covid-19 came to Malaysia from India?

Star Online (brief extracts):

Delhi religious centre becomes India’s latest virus hotspot

A police officer wearing a protective mask walking along an overpass inside the empty Delhi Junction railway station during a lockdown imposed due to the coronavirus in New Delhi. Indian Railways, the world’s fourth-biggest network, is converting at least 5,000 coaches into isolation wards amid fears the world’s most populous country after China may not have adequate infrastructure to deal with the pandemic. - Bloomberg 

NEW DELHI: A large religious gathering in India’s capital New Delhi has emerged as one of the country’s 10 (Covid-19) coronavirus hotspots, with at least six deaths and 37 positive cases found so far.

Infections spread when about 2,000 Muslim devotees, including some visiting from Indonesia and Malaysia, attended a gathering at the Tabligh-e-Jamaat’s Markaz in New Delhi’s tightly packed Nizamuddin area in mid-March.

Some 441 people from the centre are being tested for Covid-19 and 1,107 others have been placed under quarantine after the building was evacuated on Monday and Tuesday by health officials and local police, Delhi’s Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said at a press conference on Tuesday (March 31).

Arvind Kejriwal - Chief Minister New Delhi

Attendees at the religious gathering account for 24 of the 97 infections reported in the Indian capital, Kejriwal said, adding that "the whole episode was very wrong” because people at the event had spread out across the country.

Six people who had attended the Delhi gathering died in the southern state of Telangana after contracting the infection, the office of the chief minister said in a tweet.

Another 13 people who attended the same event have also tested positive in the state of Andhra Pradesh, a local government statement said. India has so far reported 1,251 coronavirus infections, including 32 deaths.



Malaysiakini:

M'sians found at Indian tabligh meet which sparked Covid-19 clusters

Tabligh-e-Jamaat’s Markaz in New Delhi 

At least 20 Malaysians were found to have attended an international tabligh gathering earlier this month in New Delhi, India, which reportedly set off several clusters of Covid-19 infections across the republic.

The Times of India reported that local police had over the last two days found 281 foreign nationals, including the 20 Malaysians, residing at the Tablighi Jamaat movement headquarters in New Delhi's Nizamuddin neighbourhood.

According to the report, foreign participants from 16 countries - including Malaysia's neighbours Indonesia and Thailand - made up a small portion of the estimated 8,000 overall attendees for the two-day gathering from March 8 to 10.

at the Tabligh-e-Jamaat in Nizamuddin

Of the total participants, it was reported that 30 attendees have so far tested positive for Covid-19 and at least three deaths are linked to the clusters.

An unnamed Indian Home Ministry official was quoted as saying that most of the foreigners risk being blacklisted from entering the country again.

"Those who came on a tourist visa but attended the Nizamuddin event stand being in our blacklist as they have violated the visa conditions.

"Tourist visa holders can't attend religious functions," the official reportedly said.

Meanwhile, Malaysian Health Ministry director-general Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah today said the ministry was investigating the tabligh gathering in India as well as a similar gathering by another branch of the movement, held in Sulawesi, Indonesia, earlier this month.

tabligh gathering in Sulawesi though cancelled by Indonesian government 

"We are investigating. Not only in India but also Sulawesi."We heard there was a big gathering [...] so it is high risk if they were attending it," Noor Hisham told reporters during the daily Covid-19 updates press conference at the Health Ministry in Putrajaya.

The first question on my worried mind is: How did some of those who were part of the gathering at the Tabligh-e-Jamaat’s Markaz in New Delhi contacted Covid-19 in the first place, if said virus (as mentioned by everyone except China, wakakaka) started in Wuhan, because Indian Muslims weren't exactly the type of people (tourists etc) who would normally visit or be in Wuhan, China?

Secondly, back in Malaysia, what worries me has been the FT Minister, Annuar Musa, okaying the coming Ramadan bazaar.

What would then be the point of the authorities now going hard on MCO violators if all the good work achieved will be abandoned when the Ramadan bazaar takes place?

UPDATE: Menteri Bazaar has now belakang pusing form his earlier okaying of the bazaar, wakakaka, even claiming the press did not report his statement correctly and in full, wakakaka again.

For more, read Annuar Musa now belakang pusing on Ramadan Bazaar.

Saya kata ini, lapuran berita pula kata itu 

To squeeze our balls even further, FAMA has just announced it will be opening 77 farmers' markets (pasar tani) nationwide, that will comply with the need for social distancing amid the Covid-19 pandemic.

Menteri LowYat2 Sabri has been reported as saying the opening of 77 farmers' markets is needed as authorities are having a hard time controlling crowds at wet markets, with many not practicing social distancing.

Hasn't he been cakap-ing ayam? Sheer kerbau - If authorities couldn't enforce 'social distancing' at the present wet markets, how will they be able to do at the proposed 77 pasar tani?

I regret to say this, but it seems Menteri LowYat2 again wants to be Menteri LowYat3.