PUTRAJAYA: As Malaysia gradually reopens the economic and social sectors, the Health Ministry has reminded the public not to ignore the perils of the Covid-19 pandemic.

       Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said the country’s Covid-19 figures remained at a “worrying stage” and must be controlled.

       “The ministry understands the importance of reopening the economic and social sectors in stages as part of the National Recovery Plan, in our effort to balance lives and livelihoods.

       “At the same time, the ministry is also striving to break the chain of Covid-19 infection and prevent the formation of more clusters.

       “The ministry’s actions will require the cooperation and compliance of all parties to keep the Covid-19 situation in the country under control. Right now, it is still at a worrying level.

       “The daily figures still show an average of 20,000 cases a day for the past seven days,” said Dr Noor Hisham in his daily Covid-19 statement.

       Yesterday, Malaysia’s Covid-19 figures reached a new high with 22,242 more cases recorded in the last 24-hour span.

       The figure surpassed the record of 21,668 cases set on Aug 12.

       The past five days saw Malaysia’s daily cases going on a steady downward trend, hitting 19,631 cases on Tuesday.

       Effective Aug 16, businesses such as car wash, clothing stores and barbers are allowed to reopen.

       Public parks are also allowed to reopen for activities such as jogging and cycling.

       Dr Noor Hisham said it was important that Malaysians do their part by strictly adhering to Covid-19 preventive measures at all times.

       “Take heed of lessons from the past that led to Covid-19-related deaths as well as the closure of economic and social sectors brought on by the increase in workplace and community clusters.

       “We should take the responsibility to prevent the country from continuing to be plagued by the pandemic.

       “Hopefully, we can return to normalcy as soon as possible and drive our country towards a more prosperous direction,” he said.

       Of yesterday’s 22,242 cases, Dr Noor Hisham said 98.1% were either mild or asymptomatic.

       The rest (1.9%) are cases in Category 3, 4 and 5 requiring hospitalisation.

       He said 83.76% of yesterday’s cases involved unvaccinated cases or had not completed their vaccination dosage.

       Some 51% of the new cases are those detected from contact tracing activities while 39% are sporadic infections and 9% are cases with links to clusters.

       There were four imported cases, he added.

       Selangor reported 6,858 new cases – the highest among all the states. Sabah and Penang reported new daily records – with 2,413 and 1,867 cases, respectively.

       Labuan continued to report low numbers, with five new cases.

       The country also recorded 225 more deaths, taking the Covid-19 death toll to 13,302. The fatalities included 35 cases declared as “brought-in-dead”.

       Meanwhile, Malaysia discharged 19,680 patients from treatment – also a new daily record.

       To date, 1,198,726 people in Malaysia have recovered from Covid-19.

       Currently, there are 254,484 active cases nationwide.

       This includes 1,060 patients who are in intensive care units and 540 who are on ventilator support.