A total of 14,525 new Covid-19 cases were recorded in the 42nd Epidemiological Week (ME 42/2022) from Oct 16-22, an increase of 21.5 percent over 11,957 cases in the previous week, said Health Ministry director-general Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah.

“Local Covid-19 cases rose by 21.6 percent to 14,493 cases from 11,916 cases,” he said in a statement today.

However, imported cases in ME 42 dropped by 22 percent, to 32 cases from 41 in ME 41.

The number of deaths in ME 42 increased by 70.6 percent, from 17 to 29, while recoveries dropped 0.9 per cent, to 11,078 cases compared to 11,180 in ME 41.

Noor Hisham said the average number of daily active cases in ME 42 was 24,867, a 9.4 percent drop from the previous week.

He said between Jan 25, 2020 and Oct 22, 2022, a total of 4,880,005 cumulative new cases and 4,816,278 recoveries were recorded.

Fatalities registered during this period totalled 36,444 while there were 7,087 clusters, with eight clusters still active.

Noor Hisham said the admission of Covid-19 patients to hospitals and Low-Risk Covid-19 Treatment Centres per 100,000 population rose by 6.9 percent in ME 42.

Admissions for categories one and two increased by 18.2 percent while those for categories three, four, and five were up 9.5 percent.

He also wished Hindus a Happy Deepavali and reminded the public to continue observing the new normal by wearing face masks in crowded places.

- Bernama

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