M’sians Panic Buying Again after the Announcement of CMCO in Certain Regions

While Singapore seems like it’s on the track to recovery for Covid-19, even with the one death yesterday, the same can’t be said for our brothers and sisters in our neighbouring country.

Previously, it was announced that Malaysia’s recovery movement control order (RMCO) will persist until the end of the year on 31 Dec 2020.

This is due to the recent spike in Covid-19 infections within the country.

Then, the Malaysian government has warned that if the situation persists, they’ll have to take even more drastic measures.

It seems like the time for action has come again.

M’sia Announces Return Of Conditional MCO

Defence Minister Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob announced on 12 Oct 2020 that the conditional MCO will return for Kuala Lumpur, Selangor and Putrajaya from 14 Oct 2020 to 27 Oct 2020.

That’s tomorrow, by the way.

Here’s what the conditional CMO entails:

• Inter-district travel is banned unless for workers who need to leave the district with a permission letter from their employee
• Only two people are allowed to leave the house for food and supplies
• All schools, universities, skill training centres, kindergartens, public parks and recreational centres are closed
• Mosques and non-Islamic house of worships are closed
• Entertainment centres and night clubs will also be closed
• All social activities including weddings will not be allowed
• However, all economic activities in Selangor, KL and Putrajaya are allowed to operate as per usual

Basically, it’s like the start of Phase Two in Singapore where economic activities restart but social gatherings are still prohibited.

And People Went Nuts

Remember what happened in Singapore when the news of Circuit Breaker broke?

Yeah, the same thing happened in Malaysia.

Shortly after the announcement broke, and with such short notice to boot, Malaysians could be seen panic-buying at various supermarkets in Malaysia.

A few images from World of Buzz also showed the aftermath of the mad rush.

Such as no meat…

And a bread drought:

A hypermart’s queue was so long it extended outside the mall:

Current Situation In M’sia

As of the time of writing, Malaysia has 16,220 confirmed Covid-19 cases since the start of the pandemic.

After a bad period from Mar to Jun 2020, Malaysia managed to bring the Covid-19 situation under control.

Unfortunately, the narrative changed in Sep 2020 and Malaysia has been fighting against a second wave of Covid-19 infections since.

Since the beginning of October, Malaysia has been reporting 3-digit new cases daily, with the highest on 6 Oct 2020 at 691 new cases detected.

While the PM of Malaysia has announced that they’re not in a rush to reopen borders between Singapore and Malaysia, the Johor government, who are now financially unsustainable, indicated that they’ve tabled a plan to reopen borders fully between both countries.

More updates on that plan will be made known next week.

You can find out more here.

By the way, you can watch this video to the end on why toilet rolls are the most sought-after products when people panic buy (and subscribe to our YouTube channel for more informative videos, please!):