New COVID-19 cases increase to 3,684

KUALA LUMPUR: New COVID-19 cases in Malaysia continued to increase to 3,684 today from 3,198 yesterday, bringing the cumulative figure for infections to 2,798,917 as at noon today, said Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah.

The daily figure was the highest in two weeks since Dec 30 when 3,997 cases were recorded.

He said there were 3,292 more recoveries, raising the total number of recovered cases to 2,726,891.

"Of the 3,684 new cases reported today, 34 cases (0.9 per cent) are in categories three, four and five while 3,650 cases (99.1 per cent) are in categories one and two. COVID-19 is a five-category disease, with category five being the most severe.

"There are 192 cases in the Intensive Care Unit, with 91 requiring ventilators," he said in a statement today.

He also said the number of active clusters is now 178 following the detection of eight new clusters today, while the national infectivity rate (Rt) was at 0.99 yesterday.

Dr Noor Hisham said the total number of positive cases among flood victims remained at 470 as reported yesterday as there had been no new cases as at 3 pm today.

The Health Ministry also detected four cases of infectious diseases involving flood victims, with two cases each of acute respiratory infection (ARI) and skin diseases.

-- BERNAMA