In a statement, health director-general Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said all nine of them were local infections.

According to analyses, Noor Hisham said, the cases were related to the Jalan Lima and Kebun Baru clusters, both in Selangor.

Further analyses also showed that the variant likely originated from a worker based at a company associated with KLIA in Sepang.

Noor Hisham said the virus then spread among residents of the Kuala Langat district.

Identified in December last year, the B.1.351 variant was first found in the UK and South Africa, before reaching other countries such as the US, Canada, Germany, Australia and South Korea.

Noor Hisham said the Kuala Langat and Sepang district health offices, along with the Institute for Medical Research, would continue to monitor the presence of the South African variant and other mutations through “virus genome sequencing” from clinical samples.

He added that as of yesterday, a total of 117 genome sequences of SARS-CoV-2 were obtained from various Covid-19 mutations.

“The health ministry will continue to be vigilant and implement various public health measures to prevent the spread of new variants in Malaysia,” he said.

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