LABUAN, July 5 — Labuan has started conducting Covid-19 real-time reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) tests at its newly completed molecular PCR laboratory facility at the Labuan Nucleus Hospital today, said Labuan Health director Dr Ismuni Bohari.
He said the RT-PCR laboratory at the Labuan Nucleus Hospital would carry out 200 tests on a daily basis at the initial stage.
“We will start carrying out the RT-PCR tests in our laboratory at the hospital beginning today with a small number of tests initially.
“The completion of the laboratory will greatly help us to speed up the tests without having to send the Covid-19 samples to the laboratory in Kota Kinabalu and the Peninsula, which will take several days to get the results,” he told Bernama here today.
Prior to the completion, Covid-19 samples for RT-PCR tests will have to be sent to the national public health laboratory (MKAK) in the Peninsula and Kota Kinabalu which resulted in a backlog of cases.
Dr Ismuni said the RT-PCR tests are also opened for the public with a minimal fee of RM151 for Malaysians and RM290 for non-Malaysians.
Labuan is still dealing with 2, 224 active cases with four active clusters at Victoria Merdeka, Patau-Patau, Simpang Sungai and Tembok Labuan.
“There is still an outstanding of 115 samples for analysis, with 12 patients are being treated in the Labuan Nucleus Hospital’s intensive care unit (ICU),” he said. — Bernama
