New COVID-19 cases down 6.6 pct last week

KUALA LUMPUR: The number of new COVID-19 cases decreased by 6.6 per cent to 26,678 cases during the 32nd Epidemiological Week (ME 32/2022) from Aug 7 to 13.

Health Director-General Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said for the same period, 60 fatalities were recorded, the same as the week before.

"The number of recovered cases in ME 32/2022 increased by 1.1 per cent, from 28,604 cases to 28,905 cases.

"The daily average of active cases for ME 32/2022 was 44,706, which is a decrease of 2.7 per cent compared to the previous week," he said in a statement on the latest COVID-19 situation, today.

Meanwhile, for admission of COVID-19 patients to hospitals and public COVID-19 Quarantine and Treatment Centres (PKRC) per 100,000 residents for patients in categories 1 and 2 increased by 5.3 per cent while for categories 3, 4 and 5 there was 11.4 per cent increase. .

Dr Noor Hisham said occupancy of Intensive Care Unit (ICU) beds increased by two per cent while for PKRC beds and non-critical beds each recorded an increase of one per cent.

In addition, he said the percentage of COVID-19 patients requiring ventilators increased by 0.3 percent in ME 32/2022 compared to ME31/2022.

He said positive COVID-19 cases monitored by COVID-19 Assessment Centres (CAC) across the country also showed an increase.

"The number of patient arrivals at CAC increased by 3.9 per cent, new cases undergoing monitoring at home rose by 2.1 per cent while cases referred by CAC to PKRC and hospitals was up by 66.4 per cent," he said.

In the meantime, he said the average RT value showed a decrease of 2.0 per cent.

He added that the results of surveillance of COVID-19 at sentinel locations across the country found that a total of 143 samples of Influenza like Illness (ILI) were detected positive for COVID-19 with a rate of 18.6 per cent while no samples of Severe Acute Respiratory Infection (SARI) were detected positive for COVID-19 in ME 32/2022

-- BERNAMA