Malaysian Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin on Friday announced a nationwide “total lockdown” starting in June as coronavirus infections in the country surged to record levels. The Covid-19 spread in the Southeast Asian nation in recent weeks has been more severe, partly due to highly transmissible coronavirus variants. “With the latest rise in daily cases showing a drastically upward trend, hospital capacity across the country to treat Covid-19 patients are becoming limited,” Mr Muhyiddin said in a statement. Malaysia reported 8,290 new coronavirus cases on Friday, its fourth straight day of record infections and bringing the total number of cases to 549,514. The number of daily fatalities have been rising, with a record daily toll of 63 earlier this week.

Source: The Nation May 28, 2021 16:01 UTC