Covid-19: Uptick in active cases, 1 death

CORONAVIRUS | Today marked the second straight day where Malaysia saw more new Covid-19 cases outnumbering the number of Covid-19 patients being discharged.

There was also a slight uptick in the number of active cases, underscoring how Malaysia's war against Covid-19 was still far from over.

However, the number of patients requiring intensive care has continued to drop.

There are 11 such patients down from 13, yesterday. Six patients require ventilator support.

There was one new death (Patient 6,942) involving a Malaysian female, 77, with other illnesses. She passed away at a medical centre in Pahang yesterday.

Malaysia's Covid-19 death toll currently stood at 114.

KL still a hotspot

The number of discharged patients over the 24-hour period ending noon today was 31, bringing the total number of recovered patients to 5,646 (80.9 percent recovery rate).

The number of new cases during the same period was 37 while the number of active cases was 1,218, up from 1,212 yesterday.

Of the new cases, two involved Malaysians returning from abroad, 22 involved foreigners and 13 involved locals.

Twenty-two new cases were detected in Kuala Lumpur. Fourteen of these cases were detected in three clusters - Chow Kit market (7 cases), Pudu (6) and Cheras security guards (1).

Sabah and Selangor recorded six new cases respectively.

There were two new cases recorded in Pahang and one in Johor.

Both "imported" cases involved Malaysians returning from Singapore.

DG: Not decreasing fast enough

Health Ministry director-general Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said the number of daily new cases was not decreasing fast enough because of clusters.

He said there are two active clusters - Chow Kit market and Pudu - in which most of the people infected with Covid-19 are foreigners.

Both these areas are under enhanced movement control order (MCO) lockdown where all residents are required to undergo Covid-19 tests.

However, he said that the number of transmissions involving locals was low, which was a sign that preventive measures taken by the ministry were working.

"If we can (keep it down to) 15 to 20 cases (involving locals), then our public health team can take it (cope). That's more important.

"So we hope in the next couple of days we can continue to maintain double digits. As long as it's below 50, I'm quite happy.

"But our target is to aim to get lower than this. We can achieve this if we can work together as one and the public adhere to the SOPs," he said.