HFMD cases will decline in a few weeks, says Khairy

The health ministry today said it expects cases of hand, foot and mouth disease (HFMD) to decline in the next two to three weeks.

Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin said the spread of the disease is usually seasonal and as the level of children’s immunity increases, the number of cases will go down.

“It will start and become a wave, and in less than a month, it will go down significantly on its own.

“When many children are exposed to this virus, their immunity level will increase and the number of cases will decrease, while intervention in terms of personal hygiene, disinfection of nurseries, childcare centres and so on also helps,” he said at a press conference in Alor Setar today.

Khairy said during the pandemic period over the past two years, children spent less time outdoors and were not exposed to the HFMD virus, resulting in low immunity.

“Hence, due to the lack of exposure to this virus, the immunity level goes down. The child has never encountered this virus. This is the classical theory of natural immunity. When not exposed to the virus, immunity will be low.

“That’s probably why the number of cases is quite high now because the Coxsackie HFMD virus is invading our children who only have naive virus (with no previous encounters to build immunity), so that’s why there will be a lot of cases at this point,” he said.

He said most cases of HFMD in the country are not serious, but that parents are advised to immediately bring their children for treatment if they have symptoms and stop sending them to daycare, kindergarten, or childcare centres if they are infected.