New COVID-19 cases in M'sia drop by more than 2,500

In a post on his official Facebook account, he said this brings the cumulative figure for positive cases to 1,662,913.

Dr Noor Hisham said Selangor again topped the daily list with 5,920 cases, followed by Sabah (3,010), Sarawak (2,224), Kedah (2,072) and Penang (1,829).

Johor had 1,809 cases, Kuala Lumpur (1,068), Kelantan (1,051), Perak (939), Pahang (610), Melaka (589), Pahang (610), Terengganu (488), Negeri Sembilan (338), Perlis (76), Putrajaya (39) and Labuan (eight).

Yesterday, Malaysia recorded 24,599 new cases, the highest since the pandemic hit the country early last year.

Dr Noor Hisham, in a statement today, said of the 22,070 new infections, 412 cases or 1.9 per cent were in categories three, four and five while 21,658 more cases were in categories one and two.

In total, 17,029 cases or 77.2 per cent of the reported new cases were those who were not or only partially vaccinated.

He said there were also 21,877 recovered cases reported, taking the total number of recoveries to 1,381,668, while adding that there are now 265,695 active cases in the country.

Also, 982 patients are being treated in the intensive care unit, with 470 of them requiring respiratory support.

However, there were also 339 fatalities reported in the last 24 hours, Dr Noor Hisham said, involving 289 Malaysians and 50 foreigners, while 99 of the cases involved those brought in dead (BID).

On the 28 new clusters, Dr Noor Hisham said 15 of them were in the community, 12 from the workplace and one more in a detention centre.

Based on the latest data, Malaysia's COVID-19 infectivity rate or R-Naught (Rt) yesterday was at 1.02 with Perlis having the highest Rt at 1.23, followed by Sarawak (1.20) and Sabah (1.19).

All states also recorded Rt rates above 1.0 except Selangor, Kuala Lumpur, Putrajaya, Labuan and Negeri Sembilan.