People wearing face masks shop at a street market in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Jan. 12, 2021. Malaysia reported 3,309 new COVID-19 infections in the highest daily spike since the outbreak, bringing the national total to 141,533, the Health Ministry said on Tuesday. (Photo by Chong Voon Chung/Xinhua)
HONG KONG, Jan. 12 (Xinhua) -- Malaysia has decided to declare a state of emergency after reporting the highest daily spike of 3,309 new cases on Tuesday, while Japan is set to expand virus emergency to the western prefectures.
Malaysian Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin said King Sultan Abdullah Sultan Ahmad Shah has consented to declare a state of emergency in the country to contain the COVID-19 outbreak.
The country's newly reported cases have brought the national total to 141,533, the Health Ministry said. Six of the new cases are imported and 3,303 are local transmissions.
Chinese pharmaceutical company Sinovac is partnering with Malaysian pharmaceutical company Pharmaniaga for the supply of 14 million doses of its inactivated COVID-19 vaccines to Malaysia after the two companies signed an agreement.
Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga is set to expand a state of emergency declared over the COVID-19 pandemic for the Greater Tokyo area to include Osaka, Kyoto and Hyogo prefectures as the virus is also continuing to surge in western Japan, sources close to the matter said.
The Afghan Ministry of Public Health confirmed 106 daily COVID-19 cases, bringing the national tally to 53,690, including 8,216 active cases. Seven patients died during the past 24 hours, taking the death toll to 2,308 since February, the ministry said in a statement.
The COVID-19 cases in Indonesia rose by 10,047 within one day to 846,765, with the death toll adding by 302 to 24,645, the Health Ministry said. According to the ministry, 7,068 more people were discharged from hospitals, bringing the total number of recovered patients to 695,807.
A total of 15 million doses of raw materials of COVID-19 vaccine from the Chinese biopharmaceutical company Sinovac Biotech arrived at Indonesia's Soekarno-Hatta Airport, the National Disaster Management Agency said.
The Department of Health (DOH) of the Philippines reported 1,524 new confirmed COVID-19 cases, bringing the total number in the country to 491,258. The death toll climbed to 9,554 after 139 more patients died from the viral disease, the DOH said.
Thailand confirmed 287 new COVID-19 cases, according to the Center for the COVID-19 Situation Administration (CCSA). Of the new cases, 278 were local infections and nine others were those recently returning from abroad and testing positive in Thailand, CCSA spokesman Taweesin Visanuyothin said.
Bangladesh reported 718 new COVID-19 cases and 16 new deaths, making the tally at 524,020 and the death toll at 7,819, the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) said.
Vaccinations against COVID-19 will begin in Bangladesh in the first week of February, professor ABM Khurshid Alam, director general for Health Services in Bangladesh under the Ministry of Health, made the announcement at a press briefing Monday.
He said they are expecting to get the first installment of the Oxford-AstraZeneca's Covid-19 vaccine from Serum Institute of India (SII) by Jan. 25.
South Korea reported 537 more cases of COVID-19 as of midnight compared to 24 hours ago, raising the total number of infections to 69,651. The daily caseload stayed below 1,000 for eight straight days, but it hovered above 100 for 65 days since Nov. 8 owing to small cluster infections in Seoul and its surrounding Gyeonggi province as well as imported cases.
India's COVID-19 tally rose to 10,479,179 as 12,584 new cases were registered during the past 24 hours, said the latest data from the federal health ministry. According to the data, the death toll mounted to 151,327 with 167 more deaths. This is the second consecutive day when the number of deaths is below 200.
The New Zealand government is putting in place a suite of additional actions to protect New Zealand from COVID-19, including new emerging variants, COVID-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins said.
