Only 1.8 pct of new COVID-19 cases from categories three to five - Khairy

He said the remaining 18,432 cases or 98.2 per cent were from categories one and two.

COVID-19 is a five-category disease, with category five being the most severe.

He said out of the overall new cases, 46 per cent or 8,640 cases involved those who had no history of vaccination, 28.9 per cent or 5,416 cases had received complete vaccination and 25.1 per cent or 4,706 cases were partially vaccinated.

"Of the total new cases, five were imported cases involving three citizens and two foreigners, while 18,757 cases involved local transmission, namely 16,532 citizens and 2,225 foreigners," he said in a statement.

He said 278 deaths were recorded today with 65 cases classified as 'brought-in-dead' (BID).

Khairy said the country's active cases stood at 265,274 of which 1,007 cases are being treated in the intensive care unit (ICU), with 464 of them requiring respiratory assistance.

He said there were 21,073 recoveries recorded, bringing the total number of recovered cases to 1,482,800 (84 per cent).

On the 42 new clusters detected, Khairy said 17 of them involved the community, 22 involved workplaces and one each linked to the detention centre, education institution as well as religious activities.

A total of 3,279 clusters had ended while active clusters stood at 1,494, he added.

Khairy said the COVID-19 infectivity rate or R-Naught (Rt) in Malaysia yesterday was 1.02, with states recording the highest Rt being Sarawak at 1.20, followed by Perlis (1.19) and Sabah (1.11).

"All other states recorded Rt above 1.0 except Selangor (0.94), Melaka (0.91), Putrajaya (0.87), Kuala Lumpur (0.83), Negeri Sembilan (0.82) and Labuan (zero)," he said.