PUTRAJAYA: Malaysia’s Covid-19 new daily cases continued hitting five figures with 11, 618 new coronavirus cases recorded in the span of 24 hours.

       The number beat the country’s record of 11, 079 cases just the previous day.

       Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said the high number was in tandem with the increased targeted screening in the Klang Valley.

       “The number of Covid-19 tests conducted on July 13 was 131, 706, which is the highest reported in a day over the last 14 days.

       “However, there is still capacity to conduct more Covid-19 tests, especially at private laboratories.

       “This capacity will be utilised in the best way in order to conduct more strategic testing, ” he said in his daily statement yesterday.

       The 41 private laboratories in the country capable of conducting Covid-19 tests processed 36, 443 RT-PCR tests on Tuesday.

       This is only 42.61% of the full capacity of the 41 private labs.

       Meanwhile, 118 more people in Malaysia have succumbed to Covid-19. This brings the country’s Covid-19 death toll to 6, 503.

       Of the new cases, 108 were Malaysians while 10 were foreign nationals. Selangor has the most number of fatalities, with 46 deaths recorded.

       Other states with death cases are Kuala Lumpur (18), Negri Sembilan (16), Johor (13), Kedah (five), Sabah (four), Sarawak (four), Labuan (two), Kelantan (two), Perak (two), Pahang (two), Melaka (two), Penang (one) and Terengganu (one).

       Of the casualties, 97 of them had underlying health conditions. The ministry also classified 13 fatalities as brought-in-dead cases.

       Nationwide, there are now 101, 359 Covid-19 patients who are hospitalised or under monitoring. Of that number, 878 are in intensive care, with 432 requiring ventilator support.

       In the same period, 6, 377 people were discharged from treatment. A total of 795, 705 or 87.6% of patients have recovered from Covid-19 in Malaysia.

       The national infectivity rate as at July 13 is at an Rt level of 1.16.

       There were also 26 new Covid-19 clusters identified by the Health Ministry.

       Of that, 15 are linked to outbreaks at the workplace.

       Another seven are community outbreaks, while four others have been categorised as high-risk group clusters.