The occupancy rate of ICU beds and percentage of Covid-19 patients who require ventilators, however, increase by 1% and 0.2%, respectively

by S BIRRUNTHA / pic MUHD AMIN NAHARUL

THE number of new Covid-19 cases dropped by 16.9% to 15,549 in the 35th epidemiological week (ME 35/2022) from Aug 28 to Sept 3 compared to 18,715 cases in ME 34/2022.

Health DG Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said for the same period, 47 deaths were recorded, a decrease of 21.7% compared to the previous week.

“The number of recovered cases in ME 35/2022 also decreased by 20.9% from 25,037 cases to 19,813 cases.

“The average number of active cases per day for ME 35/2022 is 31,333, a decline of 13.4% compared to the previous week,” he said in a statement today.

Dr Noor Hisham added that admission of patients to hospitals and Covid-19 quarantine and treatment centres (PKRC) for patients under Categories 1 and 2 also witnessed a decrease of 9.4%, while Categories 3, 4 and 5 patients decreased by 3.6% on ME 35/2022.

He said the occupancy of intensive care unit (ICU) beds in ME 35/2022 increased by 1%, non-critical beds decreased 1%, while PKRC beds decreased 2% compared to the previous week.

In addition, he said the percentage of Covid-19 patients who require ventilators increased by 0.2% in ME 35/2022 compared to ME 34/2022.

On the other hand, Dr Noor Hisham noted that the positive cases monitored by the Covid-19 Assessment Centre (CAC) nationwide show a reduction.

“The number of patient arrivals at CAC decreased by 21.4%, while new cases that are undergoing monitoring at home decreased by 18.7% and cases referred to CAC to the hospital decreased by 24.9%,” he said.

He added that the results of the Covid-19 surveillance at sentinel locations nationwide found a total of 101 influenza-like illness samples tested positive for Covid-19 at a rate of 15%, while the severe acute respiratory infection sample tested positive for Covid-19 was at 1.6%.