THE overall Covid-19 death count in Malaysia surpassed 27,000 after the Health Ministry reported 132 coronavirus-related deaths as of midnight yesterday.

The toll in the country is now at 27,113.

According to the ministry’s GitHub raw data repository, 26 of the deaths were classified as dead on arrival (DOA).

Meanwhile, only one death occurred yesterday, while the remaining 131 were backlog cases that were previously unreported. These would be backtracked to the actual date of death.

The daily figure is the sum total of the deaths that occur on the day plus backlog reports of deaths, or deaths that have just been confirmed by the health authorities to be due to Covid-19 upon completion of investigation.

Because of this, daily death numbers could vary from the actual number of deaths that have occurred on the day of the report, while the backlog is being cleared.

None of the victims that succumbed to the disease had a record of vaccination for Covid-19.

On the breakdown of deaths by state, Penang saw a spike and had the greatest number of fatalities with 33, where seven of them were DOA cases. The island-state only reported seven deaths the day before.

Sarawak was second on the list with 19 deaths, five being DOA cases.

Other states and territories that reported new deaths are Johor and Sabah with 15 each, Perak (14), Selangor (13), Terengganu and Kelantan (6 each), Pahang (4), Kedah (3), Perlis (2), Malacca and Kuala Lumpur (1 each).

No Covid-19 related deaths were reported Negri Sembilan, Labuan and Putrajaya.

Meanwhile, besides the seven and five DOA cases in Penang and Sarawak, other DOA cases were reported in Sabah with four, Johor, Selangor and Terengganu (two each), Kedah, Pahang, Perak, and Kuala Lumpur (one each).

According to the ministry’s CovidNow website, the national average for deaths per 100,000 population in the past six months is 7.9. Selangor has the highest with 13.9 deaths per population of 100,000.

The active Covid-19 caseload further dropped to 129,049 after Malaysia reported 12,884 recoveries against 9,890 new cases.

Of these cases, 103,717 patients – or 80.4% – are in home quarantine, 16,558 (12.8%) are at low-risk quarantine centres and 7,947 are (6.2%) in hospitals.

Of those admitted in hospitals, 827 are in intensive care, 445 of which require respiratory support. – October 8, 2021.