KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 3 — Malaysia’s new Covid-19 infections dropped to 4,896 today as compared to 5,551 cases yesterday.

Health Director-General Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said this brings the cumulative number of Covid-19 cases nationwide now to 2,654,474.

"Out of the total new cases today, 4,878 is of local cases involving 4,675 or (95.8 per cent) Malaysian and 203 or (4.2 per cent) foreigners,” he said in a statement.

"Meanwhile, the balance 18 cases involving 13 Malaysian and five were imported.”

He also said that 490 cases were required treatment in the Intensive Care Unit.

Out of those, 358 cases were confirmed as positive while 132 cases are suspected cases, probabilities, and cases under investigation.

Dr Noor Hisham said that cases requiring respiratory assistance are 269 cases (154 confirmed Covid-19 positive cases; 114 suspected cases, probabilities, and cases under investigation).

"Of the cases 4,896 cases today, 76 cases or 1.6 per cent fall under Categories 3, 4 and 5 while the balance 4,817 or 98.4 per cent are under Categories 1 and 2,” he said.

He also said that a total of 4,676 patients have recovered from the infections bring the cumulative number of recovery cases to 2,561,230.

Dr Noor Hisham also said Malaysia identified four new Covid-19 clusters today, which bring the number of current active clusters to a total of 227.

"As of today, Malaysia recorded a total of 5,969 clusters with 5,742 clusters have been ended,” he said.

He added that Malaysia’s rate of infection currently stands at 0.97, with Perlis, Selangor and Kuala Lumpur being the states with the highest infectivity rate, at 1.16, 1.01 and 1.01 respectively.