COVID-19: 25 new cases, six involving Kedah cluster - Health DG

KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 16 -- A total of 25 new cases was reported today, nine of which were local transmissions while 16 more were imported. 

Health director-general Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said this brings the cumulative total of positive COVID-19 cases in Malaysia to 9,200 with 216 active cases. 

He said the nine local transmissions involved seven Malaysians, one of whom was a pre-surgery screening case at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in, Kota Kinabalu, Sabah while six more were from the Tawar Cluster in Baling, Kedah, five of which were in Kedah and one more in Penang.  

“Two more local infections were detected among non-Malaysians in Kuala Lumpur where both cases were eatery workers after random screenings were done at their workplaces. 

“News about the closure of the eatery has gone viral on social media and this has caused some anxiety among customers… the district health office will conduct active case detection where further investigations and samplings will be done. The shop itself has been shut down temporarily for disinfection and sanitisation,” he said in a statement on COVID-19 developments today. 

Dr Noor Hisham said the 16 import cases, meanwhile, were from Thailand (one case in Kuala Lumpur), Hong Kong (one case in Kuala Lumpur), Indonesia (two cases in Kuala Lumpur), India (two cases in Selangor and one in Kuala Lumpur), Saudi Arabia (three cases in Kuala Lumpur), Pakistan (two cases in Kuala Lumpur), Yemen (one case in Kuala Lumpur), Lebanon (one case in Selangor), United Kingdom (one case in Selangor) and Japan (one case in Selangor).

He said there were 28 cases of recovery today, bringing the cumulative cases of recoveries to 8,859 or 96.3 per cent from the overall total.

“To date, there are seven COVID-19 positive cases in the intensive care unit (ICU), of which two require ventilator support,” he said. 

Dr Noor Hisham said as there were no fatalities reported today, the death toll remains at 125 cases, or 1.36 of the total number of cases. 

Elaborating on the Tawar Cluster, Dr Noor Hisham said with the overnight new cases, there are now 39 cases from this cluster. 

"Up to noon today, some 899 individuals have been screened from this cluster, of which 727 were screened in Kedah with 35 testing positive for COVID-19, 643 tested negative and 49 more are awaiting results. 

“Another 164 more were screened in Penang and from those, four individuals tested positive, 155 tested negative and five more are pending results. In Perak, eight were screened with five testing negative and three more awaiting results,” he said. 

Active case detection and contact screenings were continuing for this cluster, he added. 

Meanwhile, the Health Ministry informed via Twitter that three more clusters have been declared resolved, namely the Kuala Lumpur Restaurant cluster and the Ramnad Patients Under Investigation and Kuching Jetty clusters, which brought to the numbers of resolved clusters to 78.

-- BERNAMA