COVID: 22,133 new cases recorded Tuesday, second highest total this year

KUALA LUMPUR: New COVID-19 infections in the country rose to 22,133 cases today, making it the second highest total for this year.

Malaysia had previously logged 22,802 new COVID-19 cases on Saturday (Feb 12).

Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah tweeted that the country's cumulative number of positive cases now stood at 3,083,683.

He said that 99.34 per cent or 21,987 of the new cases today were in categories one (asymptomatic) and two (mild symptoms), while 146 cases or 0.66 per cent were in categories three, four and five.

Patients in categories three have pneumonia, category four need oxygen supplementation and category five require respiratory aid.

Meanwhile, Dr Noor Hisham during his daily press conference on COVID-19 informed that out of the 22,133 new cases today, 80 were import cases and 22,053 were local transmissions, while 194 cases were being treated in the intensive care unit (ICU) with 120 requiring respiratory assistance.

He said 7,584 recoveries were also recorded, bringing the cumulative number of recovered cases so far to 2,868,538.

In addition, 16 new clusters were identified with 444 clusters still active to date.

"Detailed information on the current situation of COVID-19 infection and transmissions in Malaysia will be uploaded to the COVIDNOW website at https://covidnow.moh.gov.my," he said.

Dr Noor Hisham said the country's average infectivity rate (Rt) was 1.38, with Labuan recording the highest Rt value of 1.94 followed by Sarawak and Sabah (1.56 each) and Penang (1.43).

Apart from that, he said during the recent wave of infections in the country, 1432 new COVID-19 cases had been admitted to the hospital.

"Of these 1,432 cases, 505 cases (35.3 per cent) are in categories three, four, and five; Another 927 cases (64.7 per cent) are from categories one and two; while 25 cases were admitted to the ICU and 1,407 cases placed in normal wards.

"At the same time, 984 COVID-19 cases have been discharged from the ICU and normal wards," he added.

Dr Noor Hisham said among the reasons for the admission of COVID-19 patients from categories one and two to the hospital were 'medical emergencies' (diabetes or uncontrolled high blood pressure); and those newly diagnosed with an uncontrolled non-communicable disease during the examination at the COVID-19 Assessment Centre (CAC).

-- BERNAMA