KUALA LUMPUR (April 30): Malaysia reported 21,178 new Covid-19 infections this week, a 25% jump from the 17,007 cases it recorded last week, with the number of daily cases soaring past the 3,000 mark on Wednesday — a level not seen since two months ago.
From 3,142 new cases on Wednesday, daily cases climbed to 3,332 yesterday and further to 3,788 today — the third consecutive day that daily cases came in above 3,000. This week's addition pushed cumulative coronavirus cases in the country to 408,713 from last Friday's 387,535.
Year to date, the total number of confirmed cases has surged 261.7% since the 113,010 recorded on Dec 31.
Notably, new daily cases have consistently surpassed its seven-day moving average throughout this week.
The death toll now stands at 1,506, up 6.4% from the previous week, and an increase of 219.7% year-to-date from Dec 31's tally of 471 deaths.
Active cases nearing 30,000 mark
With the persistent increase in daily cases, the number of active cases — those that carry high transmission risks — has been moving steadily towards the 30,000 mark, a level last seen two months ago on Feb 24, as the number of new infections outpace new recoveries each day.
On Friday, the Health Ministry reported that actives are now at 29,227 cases — up 29.8% from last Friday's 22,512.
The number of active cases has been in the five-figure range since November last year.
Meanwhile, total recoveries this week came in at 14,372, bringing total recoveries to date to 377,980, which translates to a recovery rate of 92.5%. In contrast, total recoveries stood at 88,941 at end-Dec last year, which indicated a recovery rate of 78.7% at that time.
R-Nought now stands at 1.12
The basic reproduction number (R-naught or R0) for Covid-19 infections now stands at 1.12, according to Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah.
While the figure has been largely unchanged throughout the week and an improvement from the 1.17 to 1.19 range seen two weeks ago, it still indicates that current Covid-19 infections would put the country at over 5,000 cases a day before the end of May — according to the Health Ministry's projection.
This R0 or Rt projects the average number of people that each new Covid-19 patient will infect, or what is termed the effective reproduction number. An R0 of less than 1.0 means the infection is not spreading.
As of Friday, Kelantan has the highest R0 of 1.24, followed by Kuala Lumpur (1.23), Kedah (1.22), Selangor (1.19) and Negeri Sembilan (1.19).
Selangor leads with the biggest jump in daily and weekly cases
Selangor posted the biggest increase in daily cases on Friday with 1,265 new infections reported, making up a third of the new cases, followed by Sarawak (760), Kelantan (464), Kuala Lumpur (255) and Penang (250).
Selangor also recorded the biggest jump in new cases for the week, with an addition of 6,398 new cases since last Friday, followed by Sarawak (3,910) and Kelantan (3,157).
Total confirmed cases in Selangor have soared to 132,890, making it the State with the highest number of cumulative cases followed by Sabah (58,136) and Johor (45,377).
544,018 people received their second dose of vaccine
As of today, 877,646 people have received their first dose of the vaccine under the first phase of the National Covid-19 Immunisation programme. Of these, 544,018 have gone on to receive their second dose.
According to Health Minister Datuk Seri Dr Adham Baba, Selangor has given out the highest number of vaccinations, with 116,515 shots administered, followed by Kuala Lumpur (89,663 doses) and Sarawak (89,240 doses).
The five States with the highest number of double-dose recipients are Selangor (190,123), Sarawak (145,380), Kuala Lumpur (138,940), Johor (126,022) and Perak (121,822).