SINGAPORE – Confirmed Covid-19 infections have more than doubled in Malaysia since unprecedented nationwide restrictions on movement went into effect on March 18, shuttering non-essential businesses and bringing military patrols onto the nation’s streets.

Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin announced today (March 25) that his government’s Movement Control Order (MCO) would be extended to April 14, two weeks beyond its initial March 31 cut-off date.

Foreign and interstate travel is banned under the order, and people may only leave their homes for essential shopping, which has brought the economy to a near standstill. Police have so far arrested 110 people for flouting the order.

Undocumented immigrants, including those from the Rohingya refugee community, are among those who attended a religious gathering in late February that has become the region’s largest-known disease cluster.

Some 3,800 of those who attended the Islamic missionary event have yet to come forward for screening and are feared to be accelerating community spread across Malaysia.

The premier has maintained that foreigners would have to pay for testing and treatment at public hospitals. But at a press conference later that day, health director general Noor Hisham said foreigners would be exempt from paying medical fees for coronavirus cases at government facilities, in keeping with the previous government’s cost exemption policy.