KUCHING, Sept 26 — A total of 472 Covid-19 cases sequenced between between Sept 13 and 25 nationwide were found to be of the Delta variant, according to infographics released by Health Director-General Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah on his Facebook page last night.
It also revealed the bulk of the cases were found in Sarawak with 302 out of the cases sequenced.
This was followed by Selangor which recorded 54 Delta cases, Sabah 25 and Penang 23, while the Delta variant were also found in cases in Johor, Kuala Lumpur, Perlis, Terengganu, Kedah, Negri Sembilan, Melaka, Putrajaya and Kelantan.
It was also revealed that three cases of Beta, another Variant of Concern (VOC), were also detected nationwide during the same period.
Two cases of the Beta variant were detected in Sabah and one case was found in Penang.
Dr Noor Hisham in his remarks stated that these latest numbers now bring the cumulative number of cases involving VOC and Variant of Interest (VOI) in the country to 1,860.
“Of the total, 1,840 are VOC, while 20 involve VOI,” Dr Noor Hisham said.
He said the Delta variant topped the list with the most cases (1,612), followed by Beta (214) and Alpha (14).
“For VOI, 13 cases were involving Theta, four were involving Kappa while three were involving the Eta strain,” he added.
Sarawak also topped the list for the cumulative number of cases involving VOC and VOI, with 1,059 of the total 1,860 cases nationwide.
This was followed by Selangor (224), Johor (83), Penang (64), Sabah (63), Kedah (57), Kuala Lumpur (57) and Pahang (57).
He also informed the cases were identified through studies carried out by three research institutes namely Institute of Medical Research (IMR), Integrative Malaysia Pharmacogenomics Institute (iPromise) of Universiti Teknologi Mara, and Universiti Malaysia Sarawak’ Institute of Health and Community Medicine (IHCM).
In another Facebook post, Dr Noor Hisham shared another set of infographics which revealed that all states and territories in Malaysia having recorded an infectivity rate (Rt) of below 1.0, except Pahang and Putrajaya with a value of 1.02 each.
According to the infographics, Malaysia’s Rt value was at 0.9 as of Sept 25. The Rt value refers to the average number of people that a person who has the coronavirus, has infected.
Terengganu had the second highest Rt value at 0.99, followed by Kelantan and Perak with 0.98 each. Sarawak’s Rt was recorded at 0.97. — Borneo Post
