KUCHING, Feb 16 — Houses of worship under Covid-19 yellow and green zones are now allowed to open for prayers only, an updated State Disaster Management Committee (SDMC) Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) said.
Released with the Unit for Other Religions and updated yesterday, the SOP said, however, that the procedures for the Prevention and Control of Covid-19 must be abided at all times.
“Other activities like cultural activities, funeral services, wedding services, meetings, seminars, courses and so on are still not allowed,” it said.
It said that not more than 100 people at any one time are allowed to attend the prayer session and this is also subjected to the size of the house of worship.
Among others, it also said worshippers with chronic illnesses, senior citizens and children 12 years old and below were not encouraged.
At the same time, inviting preachers or speakers from outside Sarawak is not allowed unless they have been in the state for 30 consecutive days.
The Health Ministry categorises districts with no cases as green zones and those with one to 20 cases over a two-week period as yellow zones, 21 to 40 as orange zones and 41 and above as red zones.
For red and orange zones, SDMC said prayer sessions were still not allowed for the general public.
“With the exception of the Enhanced movement control order (EMCO) areas, only committee members or live streaming crew are allowed in the house of worship. They must also abide by the SOP for the Prevention and Control of Covid-19 at all times,” it said.
It added that the number of committee members or live streaming crew is limited to 12 people only.
The whole of Sarawak is now under the conditional movement control order until the end of the month.
The number of Covid-19 cases in the state rose to 6,832 yesterday with 61 fatalities. — Borneo Post Online
