Recoveries reach 3,000 as COVID-19 cases in Philippines jump to 13,434
MANILA, Philippines (Update 1, 4:54 p.m.) — The number of patients in the Philippines who have survived the coronavirus disease reached the 3000-level Thursday following the announcement of 68 more recoveries.
Total recoveries accounted for 22% of the nation’s confirmed cases, which stood at 13,434.
“Many of you are wondering why we have a relatively low recovery rate. That’s because our current recoveries are based on strict definition that confirmed COVID-19 positive patients need to have repeat RT-PCR tests,” Dr. Beverly Ho, OIC director for DOH’s health promotion and communication service said.
Of the 213 newly-reported COVID-19 cases, 46% were logged in outbreak epicenter Metro Manila. Another 46% of the additional infections were recorded in Central Visayas—where Cebu City is located—while 8% were spread out across the country.
The DOH said there were four new virus-related deaths in the country. This raised the fatality count to 846.
Health Secretary Francisco Duque III on Wednesday said the Philippines was already dealing with the second wave of COVID-19 infections. He classified the first three imported cases in the country as the “first wave” of infections.
Medical experts and even disagreed with Duque’s pronouncement, saying the country is still dealing with the first wave of COVID-19 infections because the epidemic curve has not yet flattened.
A day after he told senators that a second wave is here, Duque told House lawmakers that the country is dealing with the “first major wave of community transmission.”
Latest data showed that the number of individuals tested for the coronavirus stood at 207,823. A target of 30,000 tests per day has been set for the end of May and 50,000 by end-June.
The World Health Organization on Wednesday reported 106,000 new coronavirus cases—the most in a single day since the outbreak began. More than 4.9 million COVID-19 cases have been registered since the outbreak began in China last December.
Global deaths from the pandemic stood at 328,115. — with report from Agence France-Presse
Follow this page for updates on a mysterious pneumonia outbreak that has struck dozens of people in China.
New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins says on Sunday that he had contracted COVID-19, testing positive at a key point in his flailing campaign for re-election.
Hipkins saYS on his official social media feed that he would need to isolate for up to five days -- less than two weeks before his country's general election.
The leader of the centre-left Labour Party said he started to experience cold symptoms on Saturday and had cancelled most of his weekend engagements. — AFP
The World Health Organization and US health authorities say Friday they are closely monitoring a new variant of COVID-19, although the potential impact of BA.2.86 is currently unknown.
The WHO classified the new variant as one under surveillance "due to the large number (more than 30) of spike gene mutations it carries", it wrote in a bulletin about the pandemic late Thursday.
So far, the variant has only been detected in Israel, Denmark and the United States. — AFP
The World Health Organization says on Friday that the number of new COVID-19 cases reported worldwide rose by 80% in the last month, days after designating a new "variant of interest".
The WHO declared in May that Covid is no longer a global health emergency, but has warned that the virus will continue to circulate and mutate, causing occasional spikes in infections, hospitalisations and deaths.
In its weekly update, the UN agency said that nations reported nearly 1.5 million new cases from July 10 to August 6, an 80% increase compared to the previous 28 days. — AFP
The head of US intelligence says that there was no evidence that the COVID-19 virus was created in the Chinese government's Wuhan research lab.
In a declassified report, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) says they had no information backing recent claims that three scientists at the lab were some of the very first infected with COVID-19 and may have created the virus themselves.
Drawing on intelligence collected by various member agencies of the US intelligence community (IC), the ODNI report says some scientists at the Wuhan lab had done genetic engineering of coronaviruses similar to COVID-19. — AFP
Boris Johnson deliberately misled MPs over Covid lockdown-breaking parties in Downing Street when he was prime minister, a UK parliament committee ruled on Thursday.
The cross-party Privileges Committee said Johnson, 58, would have been suspended as an MP for 90 days for "repeated contempts (of parliament) and for seeking to undermine the parliamentary process".
But he avoided any formal sanction by his peers in the House of Commons by resigning as an MP last week.
In his resignation statement last Friday, Johnson pre-empted publication of the committee's conclusions, claiming a political stitch-up, even though the body has a majority from his own party.
He was unrepentant again on Thursday, accusing the committee of being "anti-democratic... to bring about what is intended to be the final knife-thrust in a protracted political assassination".
Calling it "beneath contempt", he said it was "for the people of this to decide who sits in parliament, not Harriet Harman", the veteran opposition Labour MP who chaired the seven-person committee. — AFP
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