MECHANIC Kook King Ching is the latest winner of a lucky draw organised for those who have received both vaccine doses. Lean Kim’s younger sister Lean Hua, 59, a company employee who has received both her doses, accompanied Lean Kim. The PPV at SPICE Convention Centre is open seven days a week. “However, when I got to know about the walk-in vaccination process for senior citizens at SPICE Convention Centre, I wanted her to come here for her dose. He said the PPV at SPICE Convention Centre was open seven days a week and gave an assurance that any elderly person who wanted to be vaccinated could just walk in.

GEORGE TOWN: Many companies in the state prefer to conduct their businesses online as less than 50% of the adult population in Penang is fully vaccinated. “Business is still manageable as we started off as an online business before having a physical shop in March this year. As of Aug 17, only 30.3% of the state’s total population and 39.3% of its adult population are fully vaccinated. Kuan added that she would not open her door for business yet as the adult population in Penang are not fully vaccinated. On Sunday, the National Security Council had announced that 19 more business sectors were allowed to reopen for fully vaccinated customers.

Pink Garage operation manager Kelvin Lee, who runs a business providing tyre and auto services besides accessory installation, said his focus would remain on fixing problems that are essential. “It takes extra work to calculate their vaccination completion dates through their MySejahtera and being fully vaccinated is not Covid-19 proof. Lee, who operates three workshops in the area, urged other businesses to operate responsibly although many sectors were now allowed to open for customers who have completed their vaccination. Similarly, at a camera shop in Jalan Burma that is now allowed to open, business is focused on e-commerce sales with a change in shopping trend among consumers. On Monday, the National Security Council announced 19 more business sectors allowed to reopen for customers who are fully vaccinated.

Despite the allegations, Mohamad Helmy said almost all of the group’s customers have continued to do business with the plantation group. The group has declared an interim dividend of 7.9 sen per share for Q2 from 4.02 sen per share a year ago. Nonetheless, Mohamad Helmy confided that the group would likely register a “deficit” in its FFB production in Malaysia this year due to a severe labour shortage. “Our FFB production from Indonesia and Papua New Guinea (PNG) would cushion the impact of low production in Malaysia. “Our production in Malaysia will not improve until the labour shortage issue is resolved” he explained.

PETALING JAYA: The Covid-19 vaccination programme and related healthcare services remain intact amid the current political situation, according to the Health Ministry (MOH) and the Science, Technology and Innovation Ministry (Mosti). The Klang Valley, Sarawak, Negri Sembilan, Melaka, Labuan, and Perlis had at least 40% of their adult population vaccinated. Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said the vaccination programme and healthcare services would not be derailed, even with the current political developments. A man, who only wanted to be known as Chow, said he was surprised by how fast and efficient the vaccination process was. “It showed that the vaccination programme isn’t affected by politics at all.

For details, visit selangoradvance.com.myTRANSPORTATION REBATESelangor residents with Grab accounts are eligible for travel rebates to vaccination centres within the state. For details, visit rebatpengangkutangrabvaksin.borangmbiselangor.comVOLUNTEERS NEEDEDPetaling Jaya Parliament Office is looking for volunteers to give free online tuition classes for English and Bahasa Melayu subjects to underprivileged students from Year 1 to Form 5, every Saturday and Sunday, from 9am to 2pm. GIVE FEEDBACK> Kajang Municipal Council (MPKj) is seeking public feedback for its MPKj Strategic Plan 2021-2025. > Department of Islamic Development Malaysia family, social and community care centre at 011-959 8214 via WhatsApp. For details, visit https://rotarysentul.org/step-on-10kCONSERVATION SYMPOSIUMMalaysian Nature Society is organising an online symposium on ‘Multi-Stakeholders’ Engagement in Forest/Protected Area Governance for Conservation and Livelihood’ from Aug 23 to 27.

SOME 15,000 individuals in Johor have used the virtual Covid-19 assessment centre to get appointments at a brick-and-mortar Covid-19 assessment centre (CAC). State health and environment committee chairman R. Vidyananthan said the virtual method was to facilitate the management of Covid-19 patients as well as contact tracing in Johor. “Some 15,000 people have used the virtual service since May 15,” he said. Vidyananthan said the Johor Health Department had acknowledged congestion at a CAC in Pasir Gudang. He said although all patients going to a CAC must have an appointment, it would still accept symptomatic Covid-19 cases.

Originally targeted at helping consumers identify foods that fit their genetic profiles, the kit was quickly retooled by Toumazou last year for use in point-of-care Covid testing. “We’re trying to bring medical-grade testing technology to the consumer.”DNANudge allows doctors, nurses or other medical personnel to test saliva for small pieces of DNA that contain key information about people or pathogens. DNANudge is only Ventura’s second medical technology investment, managing partner Mo El Husseiny said in an interview. “This is what I got back,” said El Husseiny, displaying his mobile phone screen on a Zoom interview. My house has become a sugar-free zone, much to my daughters’ consternation.”Now El Husseiny said he’s becoming very involved in DNANudge.

He said a motion of confidence is usually filed within the two-week notice period before a session starts. “After that, it would usually be matters of the government unless the motion of confidence is moved by the government earlier,” said Azhar when contacted. Azhar said the motion of confidence, if moved by the government, could also precede the debate on the Royal Address. Should the motion fail, it is up to the Prime Minister to exercise his rights under Article 43(4) of the Federal Constitution,” said Azhar. Muhyiddin, who had initially promised to push for a motion of confidence in the next Parliament session, had offered seven cross-party reforms to the Opposition in order to secure enough votes to prove his legitimacy.

Universiti Putra Malaysia medical epidemiologist Assoc Prof Dr Malina OsmanMedical Practitioners Coalition Association of Malaysia president Dr Raj Kumar MaharajahUniversiti Malaya epidemiologist Prof Datuk Dr Awang Bulgiba AwangPETALING JAYA: Several states and federal territories are showing signs of a downward trend in the number of serious Covid-19 cases.Negri Sembilan, for example, is seeing a drop in the average of daily new cases over a seven-day period, or the seven-day average, for hospital admissions, patients in intensive care units (ICUs) as well as those on ventilators.This is among the findings of The Star's analysis of the Health Ministry's daily Covid-19 numbers publicly available on the GitHub online hosting platform.The data was used to calculate seven-day average figures for cases, hospital admissions as well as the number of patients in ICU and on ventilators in each state and federal territory.The federal territory of Labuan has meanwhile recorded an ever bigger drop in daily cases, hospitalisation and ICU cases since June.In Selangor, the seven-day average figures for the number of patients in ICU and those on ventilators has also started to fall.Malaysia has fully vaccinated 34.9% of its total population as at Aug 17 but many parts of the country are still seeing a worryingly high number of new Covid-19 infections each day.Are these positive developments a signal that the pandemic is about to decline in some of the states due to rising vaccinations?Health experts said a consistent drop in new Covid-19 cases, deaths, hospitalisation and serious illnesses depends on several factors.These include a high vaccination rate, effective public health measures, and high compliance with pandemic standard operating procedures (SOPs).The spread of new variants such as Delta could also impact how fast the country can expect to turn the tide against the pandemic.Universiti Putra Malaysia medical epidemiologist Assoc Prof Dr Malina Osman said that even with increased vaccination rates, everyone needs to continue sticking to public health measures such as wearing a face mask, ensuring hand hygiene and physical distancing until the burden on the country’s healthcare system eases.“Those who are fully vaccinated should not be given special allowances on movement restrictions yet as the proportion of those fully vaccinated is still relatively low and more importantly, many of our hospitals are still dealing with a high number of active cases,” she said.Medical Practitioners Coalition Association of Malaysia president Dr Raj Kumar Maharajah said to achieve herd immunity, each state needs between 50% to 90% of its population to be immune to the virus and its mutated forms.“For example, if 80% of the population is immunised and protected, then four out of five persons who comes into contact with an infected individual will not get sick.“We need an average of 70% people to be vaccinated to see a significant impact on Covid-19 cases,” he said, adding that it is still too early to ease the SOP for fully vaccinated individuals due to mutated variants which are not immune to the vaccine.Dr Raj Kumar said that the spread of Delta and other new variants could mean that vaccine booster shots may also be required.“All those who want to let their guard down must be well informed of the risks involved and be responsible for their actions,” he said.Universiti Malaya epidemiologist Prof Datuk Dr Awang Bulgiba Awang meanwhile believes that it is still too early to tell whether vaccinations had caused the drop in cases in places such as Labuan.“The decline in new cases in Labuan occurred before vaccination had even reached 20% of its population.“We know that 20% is too low a level for adequate population level immunity to occur, so attributing the decline in cases to vaccination alone is probably incorrect. "He noted that movement restrictions, coupled with aggressive testing and isolation by the health authorities in Labuan, may have helped control the number of new infections there.“Even if vaccinations had preceded the decline, one needs to be aware of the 'Post hoc ergo propter hoc' fallacy, which means that just because one event follows another does not mean the former caused the latter,” he said.Dr Awang Bulgiba said the impact of vaccination on new cases, deaths and hospitalisation would depend on which segments of the population were widely vaccinated.“If we manage to vaccinate a large section of the population who are at risk of severe infection such as older persons and those with comorbidities, we may see some improvement in severe disease and hospitalisation rates.“However, we may not necessarily see a drastic decline in new disease rates because the ones at risk of infection maybe younger and more mobile, so they will have more contact with others and hence are at risk of infection, albeit milder in nature,” he said. "What is happening in the United Kingdom with its drastic easing of restrictions will provide

London Metal Exchange (LME) three-month tin last week touched $35,955 per tonne, eclipsing the previous record of $33,600 dating from 2011. Currently trading around $35,400 per tonne, tin is up 68% on the start of the year. Fastmarkets has lifted its U.S. Midwest delivery premium assessment to a record high of $3,600-$4,400 over the LME cash price. Until they do, it's hard to see how the tin supply chain is going to normalise. China doesn't have any strategic tin stocks to sell as it does for copper, aluminium and zinc.

A fair value surplus of RM324.3mil derived from the deemed disposal of an associate, Aura Muhibah Sdn Bhd, also helped KLK to achieve the strongest quarterly net profit in 22 quarters. The plantation giant reported yesterday that its net profit for Q3 of financial year 2021 (FY21) came in at RM783.94mil, as compared to RM368.7mil in the same quarter a year earlier. KLK said its plantation segment registered a higher profit, driven by higher crude palm oil (CPO) and palm kernel (PK) selling prices in Q3 of FY21. Cumulatively, in the first nine months of FY21, KLK’s net profit surged by over 189% y-o-y to RM1.63bil from RM563.79mil in the previous corresponding period. This was due to a higher net interest expense and lower share of profit from an overseas associate, Synthomer Plc, which had more than offset the higher profit posted by the farming business.

The Oslo-based fund returned almost 14% on stocks, with energy investments up nearly 20%, it said yesterday. Earlier this week, he said that inflation was now emerging as the biggest threat to returns with both stocks and bonds potentially vulnerable. FILE PHOTO: A general view of the Norwegian central bank, where Norway's sovereign wealth fund is situated, in Oslo, Norway. What’s more, “the highest returns shifted from growth stocks to value stock.”Since Tangen started as CEO, Norway’s wealth fund has spoken more publicly of a commitment to sustainability. The move represented a landmark expansion of the list of the fund’s asset classes, which had been limited to stocks, bonds and real estate.

PUTRAJAYA: All trade and distribution sub-sectors in states under Phase Two of the National Recovery Plan (NRP) can resume operations even if the number of fully vaccinated individuals in those states has yet to reach 50% of the adult population. The Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Ministry said the states involved are Kelantan, Terengganu, Pahang, Perak, Penang and Sabah. “Industry players and premises owners can operate without having to wait for approval from the ministry. Among them are photography shops and services, shops selling second-hand items, florists and nurseries, handicraft and souvenir shops, antique shops, toy stores, carpet shops and creative content and creative industry equipment stores. It stressed that premises owners listed as trade companies that could resume operations must ensure customers who enter their premises show their digital Covid-19 vaccination certificate as proof.

IPOH: A woman was seen leaving the Meru Desa Park guardhouse on foot a day after an alleged rape incident involving an assemblyman, the High Court here heard. Asked the direction that the woman was heading, he said the road led out of the residential area towards the traffic lights. “Is there any CCTV pointing to the road leading towards YB Paul’s house?” he said, referring to Yong, to which the witness replied “no”. Lee Yeong Wai said they reached Meru Desa Park at about 8.30pm and he chatted with Yong outside his house before returning home. The offence was allegedly committed in a room on the top floor of this house in Meru Desa Park between 8.15pm and 9.15pm on July 7 of that year.