KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 8 — As Malaysia’s daily confirmed Covid-19 cases decreased over the past few days, the number of coronavirus-related casualties rose, hitting an historic daily high of 24 deaths today.
Since February 6, Malaysia’s daily death toll increased from 12 to 24 deaths today, while the daily reported Covid-19 cases dropped from 3,847 cases on February 6 to 3,100 cases on February 8.
Over the past one week, on average, 18 people have died each day from Covid-19 in Malaysia.
Nine out of the 24 deaths reported today were females, while 15 of them were males. Five of them had no history of comorbidities while the rest had underlying conditions such as diabetes, hypertension, dyslipidemia, chronic kidney disease, etc. The youngest death reported was a 44-year-old Malaysian woman with underlying hypertension and anemia.
Six of the cases were brought in dead, among which were reported in Sabah (two cases), Kuala Lumpur (two cases), Melaka (one case), and Perak (one case). Brought-in-dead means the victims died before they could seek medical treatment.
An analysis published on CodeBlue showed how as compared to 2020, deaths among Malaysians dropped from 10 days after admission last year, to seven days after admission in January this year.
Meanwhile, the average number of tests conducted to screen for Covid-19 has decreased as compared to last week. Between January 25 and January 31, the average number of daily tests conducted was 57,016, while between February 1 to February 7, the average number of daily tests dropped by 3.5 per cent to 55,062 tests.
This could possibly mean that the decreasing trend of daily new Covid-19 cases may not reflect the actual situation on the ground as based on MOH’s new guidelines, only those with Covid-19 symptoms will be screened.
With 3,100 new cases reported today, the total number of active cases has increased to 51,977, including 282 patients in the intensive care unit, among which 134 of them on ventilator support.
Previously, Health director-general Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah told a press conference that severe Covid-19 cases (stage four and five) have multiplied by five times during the third wave of the epidemic, comprising 15 per cent of daily infections reported.
