Covid: New cases fall to 3,733 but daily fatalities at record high

KUALA LUMPUR: The number of daily Covid-19 cases nationwide fell yesterday to 3,733, but a total of 26 fatalities were also recorded – the highest daily death toll so far.

Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said the latest development brought the cumulative positive cases in the country to 440,667 while the overall Covid-19 death toll was now at 1,683.

He said the breakdown of new cases comprised 3,727 local transmissions and six import cases, while active cases stood at 37,060.

“The death cases involved 25 Malaysians and a foreigner aged between 49 and 85 with the majority having chronic underlying health conditions,” he said in an official statement on the development of Covid-19 yesterday.

On Saturday, Malaysia reported its highest daily death toll with 25 cases.

Dr Noor Hisham said Selangor continued to record the highest new cases with 1,278 infections followed by Sarawak (454), Johor (365), Kuala Lumpur (338), Penang (280), Kelantan (254) and Negeri Sembilan (205).

Kedah reported 176 cases followed by Pahang (100), Perak (80), Sabah (61), Melaka (66), Putrajaya (20) and Labuan with six cases while Perlis has one case. In this regard, he said there were 3,211 recovery cases during the same period taking the overall recovered patients to 401,934, while 416 cases are still being treated at Intensive Care Units (ICU) with 216 patients requiring respiratory assistance.

The Health director-general also said 13 new clusters were detected yesterday involving five workplace clusters, five community clusters, two religious clusters and one at a private education institution registered with the Education Ministry (KPM).

The workplace clusters involved Jalan Satu cluster and Lorong Tiung cluster in Selangor; Jalan Tun Hussein Onn construction site cluster and Kampung Selamat Kopitiam in Penang as well as Kawasan Industri Dua cluster in Johor, “The community clusters involved two in Sarawak namely Jalan Stadium Negeri cluster and Tebedu Mawang cluster; Sri Tualang cluster (Kelantan); Jalan L Sungai Behrang cluster (Perak) as well as Lak Lok cluster (Terengganu and Kelantan).

“The religious clusters are Jalan Haji Mahmud cluster (Johor) and Tanah Merah Keagamaan cluster (Negeri Sembilan) while the Desa Murni cluster in Penang is the private education institution cluster.