COVID: 214 new cases in categories three to five

KUALA LUMPUR: Some 214 cases out of the 33,406 new COVID-19 cases recorded in the country yesterday are in categories three, four and five.

Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah, in a statement today, said the remaining 33,129 cases were in categories one and two, hence bringing the cumulative total of cases in the country to 3,595,172.

"Of the 214 cases in categories three to five, 60 cases involved unvaccinated individuals or those who have yet to complete vaccination while 101 cases were fully vaccinated but have not received the booster dose.

"Apart from that, 53 cases had received booster doses, 96 cases involved individuals aged 60 and above, 70 cases have comorbidities and one case involved a pregnant woman," he said.

He said a total of 2,019 COVID-19 cases were admitted to hospitals yesterday, comprising 772 cases in categories three to five and 1,247 cases in categories one and two.

Dr Noor Hisham also said that a total of 371 cases required treatment in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) with 226 cases requiring ventilator support, while 27,143 recoveries were reported yesterday, taking the cumulative total of recovered cases to 3,250,793.

On the ICU bed usage, he said seven states recorded bed utilisation of more than 50 per cent, namely the Federal Territory (FT) of Putrajaya (83 per cent), Johor and FT of Kuala Lumpur (65 per cent), Perlis (64 per cent), Kelantan (63 per cent), Selangor (62 per cent) and Perak (55 per cent).

In addition, the country's infectivity rate (Rt) now stood at 1.05, with Sarawak recording the highest Rt at 1.41, followed by Perak (1.26), Kuala Lumpur (1.25) and Terengganu (1.15), he said.

Meanwhile, Dr Noor Hisham said as of Feb 18, a total of 128 self-test kits have received approval from the Medical Device Authority (MDA) and are available in pharmacies, health facilities and selected shops.

He said MDA continues to monitor the safety and performance of the approved self-test kits and urged the public to report any issues related to the test kits to the suppliers or MDA.

"The Health Ministry strongly recommends that the public optimise the use of RTK-Ag self-test to detect COVID-19 infection and report the test results through the MySejahtera application.

"This measure is important to ensure that the community can carry out daily activities safely and help the country continue its socio-economic recovery and growth more sustainably," he said.

-- BERNAMA