PETALING JAYA: Five more Covid-19 cases linked to the recent special Parliament sitting in July has been detected, says the Health Ministry.

       This brings the total number of cases linked to the Parliament sitting to 102 to date.

       Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham said the five new cases involved five family members, where the index case was an individual who attended the Parliament proceedings from July 26 to 29.

       “All of them have completed their two doses of the vaccine. They have mild symptoms and are undergoing quarantine in their respective homes.

       “Three cases have a high cycle threshold value of between 16.98 and 22.76 (which indicates high infectivity rates),” he said in a statement yesterday.

       Dr Noor Hisham added that with the five new cases, there were now 30 cases that could be traced back to individuals who attended the Dewan Rakyat sitting.

       One of the 30 cases was Datuk Jaimin Samitah who died of Covid-19 on Aug 9.

       He was the special officer to Datuk Guandee Kohoi and had accompanied the Deputy Tourism, Arts and Culture Minister during the special Parliament sitting between July 26 and 29.

       In addition to the 30 cases, 56 cases were detected during the pre-screening process before the Dewan Rakyat sitting and another eight cases from the Dewan Negara pre-screening process.

       Dr Noor Hisham said stricter measures will be taken when Parliament reconvenes in September in order to minimise the risk of transmission before and during the proceedings.

       He said this included having better ventilation in the premises, disinfecting the premises at least twice a day and having random Covid-19 screening during proceedings.

       Meanwhile, another 20,546 new cases were detected yesterday, plus another 16,945 recoveries.

       About 86.6% of the new cases involved those who were not inoculated or have not completed their vaccination regime.

       Dr Noor Hisham said a total 17,802 newly reported cases did not have a vaccination history.

       “Please get the Covid-19 vaccine to reduce the risk of getting a serious infection. It is hoped that this will reduce the spread of the virus in the country,” he said.

       He added that 373 cases, or 1.8% of the total number of new cases were classified as belonging to Categories 3, 4 and 5.

       Another 98.2% of the cases had no symptoms or mild symptoms.

       “This is based on the clinical condition of the case when they have just been diagnosed with Covid-19,” he clarified, adding that some cases do get reclassified based on improvement or deterioration.

       There were 282 fatalities reported in the same 24-hour span.

       Out of the total, 108 were in Selangor, 45 in Kuala Lumpur and 44 in Johor.

       This was followed by Penang (24 deaths), Kedah (15), Perak (13), Sabah (nine), Sarawak (six), Melaka (six), Negri Sembilan (five), Pahang (four) and Kelantan (three).

       There were 101 cases that were brought in dead, while 200 of the fatalities had comobirdities.

       Meanwhile, there were 29 new Covid-19 clusters detected in the country with 17 linked to workplace transmission.

       Another 10 involved community transmission, while the remainder were detected among high-risk groups.

       The states with the most clusters were Selangor (six), Johor (five) and Kelantan (five).