PUTRAJAYA: Health authorities are waiting to see if there is a spike in Covid-19 cases following an incident in the Kuala Lumpur Courts Complex on Tuesday (July 28) where social distancing was breached.

Health director-general Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said if the failure to follow standard operating procedure (SOP) in the courts complex caused an increase in the number of cases, this would become apparent in two weeks.

“For now, there is nothing much that we can do as the incident has already happened.

“If in two weeks we see the number of cases going up, then we will take necessary steps to do contact tracing.

“We hope there will be no major infections following the failure of social distancing,” he said on Wednesday (July 29).

Images showing a crowd breaching social distancing rules outside the Kuala Lumpur Courts Complex on Tuesday dismayed Dr Noor Hisham.

The Health Ministry, he said, had been reminding Malaysians every day to abide by the SOP of maintaining a safe distance of at least 1m, wearing face masks and frequent hand-washing.

Dr Hisham said practising social distancing was crucial in preventing the spread of the Covid-19.

He pointed out that ensuring at least 1m in distance would reduce the risk of infection by 65%.