A DBKL worker disinfects public spaces near Masjid Jamek in Kuala Lumpur April 8, 2020. ― Picture by Miera Zulyana

KUALA LUMPUR, April 28 — A Singaporean think tank has predicted that Malaysia’s Covid-19 outbreak will be fully contained by July this year.

The Data-Driven Innovation (DDI) Lab of Singapore University of Technology and Design predicted that the pandemic will be 97 per cent contained in Malaysia by May 7.

It further predicted the figure will then increase to 99 percent by May 20, with full containment on July 8.

DDI said it used existing knowledge of historical pandemic process patterns and continuously accumulated data of the current pandemic, making it possible to use a model-based and data-driven approach to objectively predict the end dates of Covid-19.

It says the pandemic life cycles vary by countries, and different countries might be in different phases of life cycles at a specific point in time.

DDI came up with these predictions by studying the underlying dynamics like population growth, diffusion of new technologies and infectious diseases while using established mathematical models, including the logistic model that describes a general life cycle phenomenon (such as population growth) and the SIR (susceptible-infected recovered) model that describes the spread of infectious diseases.

Based on its study, Qatar will be the last country to get rid of Covid-19 on February 2, 2021. China, the country of origin for Covid-19, is predicted to fully rid itself of the virus on April 9.

Other countries included were Singapore (July 16, 2020), Thailand (June 11, 2020), Indonesia (August 29, 2020), Philippines (July 7, 2020), Vietnam (May3, 2020), Australia (June 3, 2020), US (September 2, 2020), Spain (August 2, 2020), Italy (August 30, 2020) and Iran (October 24, 2020).