Indonesia's coronavirus death toll yesterday jumped from five to 19 and Malaysia warned of "a tsunami" of cases if people did not follow new movement restrictions as infections surged across Southeast Asia.

The number of cases across the region has risen nearly 10-fold this month to more than 1,850, driven in part by hundreds of infections stemming from a mass Muslim gathering in Malaysia just over two weeks ago.

Indonesia, the world's fourth most populous country with more than 260 million people, only announced its first two cases of the virus on March 2 despite widespread suspicions that a lack of testing concealed a bigger problem.

Its death toll jumped to the highest in the region yesterday, while the Philippines also recorded a rise of three fatalities to 17. Indonesia recorded its biggest daily jump in confirmed infections, by 55 to 227 cases.

There has been criticism of the pace of testing in Indonesia with only 1,372 people tested by yesterday - far below that of much smaller neighbours.

As Malaysia imposed two-week movement restrictions, it also announced a further 117 infections. That brought it to 790 cases, although it has so far had only two deaths.

Nearly two-thirds of the infections in Malaysia stem from a mosque event in Kuala Lumpur from Feb 27 to March 1 attended by pilgrims from Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand, Brunei, Cambodia and elsewhere.