Thread by @boosulyn

One long speech that doesn't address anything nor lay out govt's plans for next 3 months, 6 months, a year, as we'll likely face Covid until 2022. Nearly a year of school lost for public students, and soaring unemployment and business closures, with daily workers hit hard.

Instead, PM repeats darurat. Can't PN just refrain from contesting Batu Sapi, as BN and PH have, and let Warisan win uncontested? Even if independent candidates contest, campaigning events will be few. As for Sarawak, can't PN's GPS partner hold polls in Aug after term ends?

The govt set itself up for failure early on during the pandemic by painting an unrealistic narrative of double/ single-digit daily cases, even though it knew that the virus was still circulating in the community, just undetected because we didn't do mass testing.

Instead, govt took premature victory laps, claiming Malaysia to be among the "best" countries handling Covid, celebrating with made-up awards and blithely ignoring the fact that Malaysia is not unique. I'll repeat that again -- we are NOT unique.

We locked down early, hard, and long with the first March MCO -- a good strategy similarly adopted by some countries. But the govt seems to have wasted all the rakyat's blood, sweat and tears by failing to boost health care capacity, as can be seen in the Sabah crisis.

Yet at the same time, govt claims Sabah's health care system isn't failing. Also implemented a 1-mth CMCO in Klang Valley that killed businesses struggling to recover after MCO, without any surge in testing accompanying the lockdown here, and despite KV's superior health capacity

Which means Covid will continue circulating in Klang Valley after CMCO is lifted. Lockdowns only freeze the virus in place, as WHO's special Covid envoy says. They're not the cure - politicians & civil servants don't understand impact on business because they get regular salaries

Malaysia is not Sg, New Zealand, Taiwan. We have very poor health literacy. Anthony Fauci says he only expects US to see some semblance of normality in 2022. If that's his prognosis, I believe Malaysia will be the same. We can't pin our hopes on a vaccine.

There are issues with vaccine storage, distribution, among others. The first vaccine batches will only be enough for certain people. So, Malaysians must be prepared to live Covid Normal while facing continued virus transmission for the next one year. Are we prepared to do that?

Unfortunately, I don't think we are. Politicians and civil servants themselves are not health literate, because it's business-as-usual to them, as they hold unnecessary face-to-face events like groundbreaking ceremonies, physical press conferences, political meetings etc.

Political leaders still don't wear face masks in public, no social distancing. They just see Covid SOPs as normal everyday rules that don't apply to them. No use increasing punishments in Act 342, which is what the govt is considering, if double standards persist.

You cannot legislate health literacy. Every single one of us must be prepared to live Covid Normal for at least one year from now -- no family/ friend gatherings at home, no large gatherings of any kind (personal/ social/ work/ religious/ political/ commercial etc).

Covid Normal living is a must in Malaysia, as long as regular, mass testing remains unavailable to the general public. The federal govt, which complains of underfunding, should also quit hoarding data and let state govts and the private sector participate in managing Covid.

Yes, federal govt used to be in charge of managing disease outbreaks. But Covid is a new challenge. So think out of the box. Let rich state govts conduct their own testing and isolation to manage outbreaks in their states to relieve Putrajaya of the burden.

If we keep on the same path, believing in our earlier shallow "victory", the "all-of-society" and "all-of-govt" approach will be an utter failure. Managing Covid successfully demands decentralisation of power, equality of treatment, and a complete change of Malaysian culture.