Today 01 June 2021 is an auspicious day for Malaysia as it began the second "Total Lockdown" since the Covid 19 virus began its attack all the world over which originated in Wuhan Province, China in late 2019. The first total lockdown took place in March 2020 and it was successfully carried out in flattening the curve. However it was at a great price where the economy went into a spin and hundreds of thousands lost their livelihoods.
Learning from the first lockdown, the essential sectors of the economy and other services such as frontline personnel manning the health and medical infrastructure as well as the internal security situation plus the allied uniformed personnel are fully deployed to enforce the Standard Operating Procedures on the authority of the Movement Control Order issued under the force of law in order to deal with the pandemic.
The second total lockdown is imposed as the daily positive cases reached unprecendeted levels never before seen in Malaysia, exceeding 9000 cases, accompanied by daily deaths of above 60. Although with the declaration of Emergency early in the year was announced to allow the authorities to focus every effort towards containing the pandemic, but it is an exercise in futility. The lax attitude of the people in adhering to the SOP strictly contributed to the present predicament facing the country. With the tightening of the SOP and increased penalties for offenders it is hoped that the second total lockdown for this critical two-weeks period will be able to flatten the curve of daily positive cases of Covid 19.
Let us supplicate for divine intervention to lift this catastrophe from the world at large and bring back at least a semblance of normality even though we have to live with this crisis amongst us for the years to come.
