KOTA KINABALU: Sabah recorded 578 new Covid-19 cases yesterday, with 233 of the cases originating from the state capital alone.
Local Government and Housing Minister Datuk Seri Panglima Masidi Manjun said 156 of the cases detected in Kota Kinabalu were from the Kepayan Prison Cluster.
“One hundred forty-five (145) of them comprised prisoners, eight of them were staff from Kota Kinabalu, one was a prison staff from Papar, one ex-convict in Sipitang and another was a close contact to one of the staff,” Masidi told reporters in his daily press conference yesterday.
Sandakan recorded the second highest number of cases yesterday at 81, followed by Tawau (65), Tuaran (43) and Semporna (350).
Masidi, who is the state’s official Covid-19 spokesperson, added that Sabah registered two new clusters yesterday, namely the Sauh Cluster at Petronas PFLNG (31 cases) and the Tinusa Cluster at Kg Tinusa 2 in Sandakan (33 cases).
He revealed that the state also registered four Covid-19 deaths yesterday, two in Sandakan and one each in Kota Kinabalu and Tuaran.
He also said that, as of yesterday, a total of 13 teachers, 27 students and two personnel from the State Education Department have tested positive for the virus.
“At the moment, there are no specific clusters for the teachers and students. The department is still investigating the source of the infection.
“At this point of time, it doesn’t seem to show that these infections came from any existing clusters,” said Masidi.
Meanwhile, Health Director-General Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said the number of new Covid-19 cases in the country jumped to 847 cases yesterday after recording a fall Wednesday apart from seeing five more deaths and 486 cases of recovery.
With the development in the past 24 hours, the cumulative positive Covid-19 cases in Malaysia now stands at 23,804 with 8,183 active cases.
According to him, from the 847 new cases, five imported cases were reported in Selangor, all of them involving non-Malaysians coming from India (four cases) and United States (one case).
“Today, Sabah still has the highest new cases of 578 (68 per cent). This is the dedicated effort of health personnel in Sabah mobilised from peninsula and other parts of the state to continue conducting screening in the field.
“In other states in the Klang Valley, there was an increase of 164 cases (19.4 per cent). From 164 new cases, 71 cases were from existing and new clusters,” he told a media conference on the development Covid-19 at the Health Ministry (MOH) yesterday.
Giving details on cases in other states, he said Selangor reported 132 cases, Negeri Sembilan (38), Federal Territories of Labuan (29), Kuala Lumpur (23), Perak (14), Penang (10), Putrajaya (four), Kedah, Melaka and Kelantan three each, Pahang (two) while Terengganu, Johor and Sarawak recorded one each.
“To date, there are 90 positive Covid-19 cases being treated at Intensive Care Unit (ICU) in which 29 cases require respiratory assistance,” he said.
On fatalities, he said four cases were recorded in Sabah involving three Malaysians and a foreigner while one case involved a Malaysian in Kedah.
Dr Noor Hisham said in Kedah, death case 200th was a 67-year-old woman in Sultanah Bahiyah Hospital who had underlying health issues such as diabetes, hypertension and dyslipidemia.
He said in Sabah, death case number 201st was a woman, 65, at Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Kota Kinabalu who had no background disease; death number 202nd was an 88-year-old man at the Duches of Kent Hospital, Sandakan who was without underlying diseases and death case number 203rd was a man, 78, at Tuaran Hospital who had a stroke.
“Another case at the Duchess of Kent Hospital, Sandakan was death number 204th involving a non-citizen woman, 60, who had no diseases.