COVID-19: National athlete finally discharged despite blood test return positive

Jackie Wong, the first national athlete to be infected with COVID-19 has been discharged from hospital after 73 days of isolation. The national hammer throw record holder was first admitted to Sibu Hospital on the 16th of March after contracting the virus from his father, Sarikei MP Wong Ling Biu.

Under the new protocol by the Ministry of Health, patients will be allowed to go home after 14 days of treatment and if there’s no deterioration of health even if the test results return positive. According to WHO, the infectivity rate after 14 or more days of treatment is nearly zero. Additional tests after treatment may return positive due to residual fragments of the virus which are no longer active.

Jackie Wong shared that he had undergone multiple swab tests and four had returned negative. However, his blood tests still continued to show positive results. Even before he was discharged, his latest blood test results still come back positive due to fragments of the virus. According to Jackie in his Facebook video, his discharge letter mentions that it is no longer infectious to others.

He also thanked the frontliners especially the doctors and medical staff for taking care of him during his stay at the hospital. He also reminded everyone to adhere to the SOPs under the conditional movement control order.

Malaysia records its lowest daily number of cases throughout the MCO with just 10 new cases reported today. There are also no new deaths reported for 6 consecutive days. At the moment, there are a total of 7,629 confirmed cases and 80.86% of cases have recovered and discharged.

[ SOURCE, IMAGE SOURCE ]

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