Malaysia and the Philippines logged thousands of new COVID-19 cases on 31 January, announced the countries’ respective health agencies.

Malaysia reported 5,298 COVID-19 cases and 14 fatalities on the day, bringing the respective figures to 214,959 and 760, said the country’s Ministry of Health.

Nearly 166,050 patients were declared to have recovered.

On the same day, the Philippine Department of Health said that 2,103 more cases were detected, raising the national count to 525,618, with a death toll of 10,749.

Since COVID-19 broke out in January 2020, the Philippines, with a population of 110 million, has carried out testing for more than 7.3 million people.

Chief of the country’s COVID-19 task force Carlito Galvez said at least 5.6 million doses of two foreign-made COVID-19 vaccines are expected to arrive in the Philippines in the first quarter of the year for the vaccination programme.

The Philippine government aims to secure 148 million doses, aiming to inoculate 70 million people this year.

Review committees from the World Health Organisation, UNICEF and the vaccine alliance GAVI granted the country the vaccines after the Philippines demonstrated its preparedness to receive them, Galvez added.

The Philippines, with Southeast Asia’s second-biggest COVID-19 outbreak at more than half a million infections and over 10,000 deaths, aims to start immunisations in February.

Source: VNA