KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 27 — Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah has warned patients seeking treatment at hospitals or going for scheduled appointments not to deceive health staff or withhold information about any symptoms they may have.
Dr Noor Hisham said such acts were unfair to frontliners carrying out their duties, as they also had family members of their own to care for.
"Do not deceive frontliners, we also need to be protected, (we) have family and friends," he said via Facebook here today.
He was referring to a recent online post by a doctor saying she had contracted Covid-19 after a patient withheld information when screened at the entrance of the hospital.
The doctor said the patient had admitted to being healthy and was allowed to enter as the body temperature also looked normal.
"I am the doctor who prepared this patient for the scan. We were shocked when the image of the lungs from the CT scan looked similar to that of Covid-19 patients.
"When asked again, the patient finally admitted that he had been having a cough and fever for a week, but then felt a little better and decided to come for the CT appointment. His actions had clearly inconvenienced others. The patient was confirmed positive for Covid-19 two days later," he wrote.
Following that, the doctor underwent a Covid-19 swab test and was also detected positive.
"The results of my swab tests came back positive. I cried when I found out, upset that I had to be separated from my children and husband. (I am) worried about family members or colleagues who I may have (inadvertently) passed on the infection to. (I’m) very disappointed with the attitude of my patient.
"Please do not deceive us if you have symptoms. Your actions can affect other patients, health workers and their families. We are also human," she said.
On December 22, Dr Noor Hisham announced that a total of 1,880 health workers had been detected positive for Covid-19 as of December 15.
— Bernama
