19 more Covid-19 variants of concern cases detected
The Health Ministry has detected another 19 Covid-19 cases involving variants of concern since May 24, bringing the total of such cases to 122 nationwide.
Health director-general Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said 15 of these cases are of the Beta variant (B.1.351) that was first detected in South Africa...
The Health Ministry has detected another 19 Covid-19 cases involving variants of concern since May 24, bringing the total of such cases to 122 nationwide.
Health director-general Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said 15 of these cases are of the Beta variant (B.1.351) that was first detected in South Africa.
Six cases were reported in Johor, five in Kelantan; while Kuala Lumpur, Kedah, Malacca and Terengganu each reported one case. All cases were locally acquired infections. This brings the total to 104 cases of the Beta variant found in Malaysia so far.
The Beta variant is associated with increased transmissibility and existing Covid-19 vaccines are less effective in preventing its infection.
Noor Hisham said the other four cases were of the Delta variant (B.1.617.2) that was first detected in India.
Three cases were reported in Labuan, and one in Kuala Lumpur.
The Kuala Lumpur case was a locally acquired infection, while the Labuan case was acquired overseas and is part of the Layangan Labuan cluster.
The Delta variant is associated with increased transmissibility and slightly reduced vaccine efficacy.
READ MORE: Vaccines vs variants: What we know so far?
In total, nine cases of the Delta variant have been detected, of which three were caught during screening upon entering Malaysian borders.
“The Health Ministry will continue to improve infectious disease control activities including continuing genomic surveillance, increasing Covid-19 testing, conducting case detection and isolation, and other public health measures to prevent the spread of these variants in the community,” he said.
For context, Malaysia’s capacity to conduct genomic surveillance is very limited, which makes it difficult to track the spread of Covid-19 variants in the country.
According to the genomic database Gisaid, Malaysia only sequenced and shared 172 Covid-19 genomic samples with the scientific community in the last 90 days, which represents 0.06 percent of its confirmed cases during the period.
