PETALING JAYA: The number of new Covid-19 cases took a slight drop with the Health Ministry reporting that 865 were recorded in the country, bringing the total number of active cases to 7,456.
The national tally now stands at 21,363.
Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said in a live press conference the majority of today’s cases stemmed from local transmissions (858) while seven were imported cases.
Three new deaths were reported, taking the number of fatalities to 190.
A total of 455 patients were discharged today, bringing the total number of recoveries to 13,717.
“There are 99 patients currently being treated in the intensive care units (ICU), with 32 of them requiring ventilator support,“ he said.
The deaths, which were all in Sabah, were of an 85-year-old man who died in Hospital Tawau, a 52-year-old man with a history of diabetes who died in Hospital Queen Elizabeth, Kota Kinabalu, and a 70-year-old woman who died in Hospital Duchess of Kent, Sandakan.
Meanwhile, the Health Ministry reported two new clusters have been detected in Hulu Langat, Selangor and Melaka Tengah, Alor Gajah and Jasin, in Malacca.
Noor Hisham said the clusters were known as Hentian cluster (Hulu Langat) and Bukit cluster (Melaka Tengah, Alor Gajah and Jasin).
A total of 127 individuals were screened from the Hentian cluster with seven positive cases detected and 120 still pending test results.
The Bukit cluster recorded a total of 89 individuals who had undergone screening till Oct 19 with 15 positive cases, 73 negative cases and one individual still pending.
Of the 858 locally transmitted cases, 767 involved locals while 91 were foreigners where five cases had a history of returning from Sabah.
This brings the number of cases reported to have a history of travel to Sabah since Sept 20 to 448.
Sabah had the most number of cases today with 643, where 183 individuals were from existing clusters, 323 were detected from close contact screenings and 117 were detected from other screenings.
A total of 101 cases were reported in Selangor with 71 individuals from existing clusters, 19 detected through close contact screenings, two who had returned from high risk zones (Sabah), one individual from the Hentian cluster and eight individuals were detected from other screenings.
Labuan recorded a total of 34 cases while Penang recorded 26 and Perak had 18.
A total of 11 out of the 16 cases in Malacca were detected in the new Bukit cluster while Kuala Lumpur recorded six cases and Negri Sembilan four.
Kedah and Putrajaya recorded three cases each while Johor recorded two.
Pahang and Terengganu had the lowest number of positive cases with just one case in each state.
