And that day is fast approaching.

Authorities are monitoring

Health director-general Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said during his daily press briefing that if positive cases continue to escalate in the country, the government will not hesitate to reintroduce the MCO, or the Conditional Movement Control Order (CMCO).

He was quoted by Bernama as saying that the timeline given by the government is around two weeks.

“Within these two weeks, if there is a sudden increase of cases and emergence of new clusters, we will do contract tracing,” he was quoted as saying.

And if the numbers continue to get out of hand, that's when the government will make a decision to reintroduce a lockdown.

According to Dr Noor Hisham, the reason why the country is seeing a sudden rise in cases was because people had violated the standard operating procedures (SOPs).

“Malaysians should always be reminded to adhere to the SOPs because its violation will lead to the spread of the infection in the community and we may have to re-enforce the MCO,” he said.

He said that Malaysians should stay at home so that the Health Ministry (MoH) could conduct field activities to contain the outbreak.

He added that if a third wave happens, the ministry’s staff will have to work harder to contain the outbreak, and that would take a toll on the frontliners.

“We have been working hard for seven months to prevent the spread, if it happens (third wave) we will have to work hard for another four months and 25,000 health personnel will be recalled to work for 20 hours a day if cases escalate,” he pleaded.