Health DG: Heed travel bans

PETALING JAYA: More than 98% of the 12,528 new Covid-19 cases reported yesterday were either asymptomatic or only had mild symptoms, says the Health director-general.

Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah warned Malaysians against sparking new clusters by visiting one another or travelling beyond state lines for Hari Raya Aidiladha, which falls on Tuesday.

He reminded the public of the many clusters that came about due to negligent behaviour during past celebration and festival periods.

“The Health Ministry would like to call on the community to take heed and not repeat irresponsible attitudes, especially during the Hari Raya Aidiladha celebration.

“The community is reminded that inter-district and interstate bans are still in force. So is the ban on visitations to celebrate the festival.“Don’t let the excitement of celebrating Hari Raya Aidiladha cause all of us to also be ‘sacrificed’ to Covid-19,” Dr Noor Hisham said in a statement yesterday.

Malaysia recorded the highest number of daily Covid-19 fatalities yesterday at 138, bringing the overall death toll to 6,866.

The nation’s cumulative cases now stands at 905,851.

More than half of the new cases yesterday (6,840 or 54.6%) were classified as Category 1 (asymptomatic), while 5,468 cases (43.6%) fell under Category 2 (mild symptoms).

One hundred and twelve cases (0.9%) were classified as Category 3 (those experiencing pneumonia or inflammation of the lungs), and 44 cases (0.4%) were in Category 4 (those who have pneumonia and require oxygen), while 64 (0.5%) were in Category 5 (critical cases requiring ventilator support).

Of the new cases, 19 were imported cases while 12,509 were local infections.

Selangor again recorded the highest daily case new numbers at 4,985.

This was followed by Kuala Lumpur (1,740), Negri Sembilan (1,280), Kedah (701), Sabah (647) and Johor (625).

The three states that recorded the fewest cases were Perlis (one), Labuan (22) and Putrajaya (41).

There were also 6,629 recoveries nationwide, making it a total of 779,171 recoveries to date.

The number of active cases is now 119,814 against a backdrop of 905,851 cumulative cases.

Twenty-eight new clusters were reported, bringing the total number of active clusters to 906.

The new clusters were from workplaces (19), communities (six), high-risk groups (two) and an education centre (one).