Covid-19 deaths (Jan 17): 12 reported fatalities, total at 31,793

COVID-19 | The Health Ministry reported a total of 12 new Covid-19 fatalities yesterday (Jan 16), bringing the cumulative death toll to 31,793.

From the newly reported deaths yesterday, none died before they could receive treatment at a hospital.

Malaysia has the highest number of deaths per capita in the Asean and East Asian regions, with 963 deaths per 1 million population and is fourth-worst in Asia after Iran, Lebanon and Jordan – all in the Middle East.

Pahang recorded the highest number of new deaths at 3, making up 25 percent of the newly reported fatalities.

The remaining deaths were in Kedah (2), Malacca (2), Johor (1), Kelantan (1), Negeri Sembilan (1), Sarawak (1) and Selangor (1).

No new deaths were reported in Perak, Perlis, Penang, Sabah, Terengganu, Kuala Lumpur, Labuan and Putrajaya.

A total of 12 out of the 12 reported deaths or 100 percent occurred in the last seven days.

An average of 25 Covid-19 deaths was reported daily in the last 30 days, compared to the seven-day average of 16, indicating a downtrend.

To date, 595 Covid-19 deaths have been reported this month.

A total of 1,174 Covid-19 deaths were reported in December 2021, 1,612 in November 2021, 2,704 in October 2021 and 9,678 in September 2021.

As of yesterday, there were 41,199 active Covid-19 cases. This is an increase of 3.2 percent from the 39,927 active infections a week ago.

Compared to 30 days ago, the number of active cases has fallen by 25.7 percent from 55,477.

The Health Ministry's post-midnight update also provided further insights into the new Covid-19 infections yesterday.

From the 3,010 new cases yesterday, a total of 292 of them could be traced to ongoing Covid-19 clusters.

From the cluster-linked cases, 183 (62.7 percent) were from education institutions while 40 (13.7 percent) were from high-risk groups such as old folks homes.

The remaining cases were traced to clusters related to workplaces (31 - 10.6 percent), religious events (20 - 6.8 percent) and community transmissions (18 - 6.2 percent).

The Health Ministry uploads the latest details of the Covid-19 pandemic after midnight on Github as part of its open data initiative.