DOH adds 883 coronavirus cases as tally eclipses 469,880
MANILA, Philippines (Update 2; 5:14 p.m.) — Days before New Year's Eve, health officials recorded 883 more cases of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) on Sunday afternoon, the lowest daily update in months and marking a total of 469,886 cases tallied in the country since the pathogen first emerged over a year ago.
In its latest case bulletin, the Department of Health also recorded another "mass recovery" of 7,635 new cured patients, bringing the total recoveries to 438,678—good for a 93.4% recovery rate.
"The decrease in cases over the holiday season is to be expected given the closure of many private laboratories for the holidays and the decrease in patients seen by those who remained open," the DOH also wrote in its Message of the Day section.
"For December 25, 148 laboratories were open, 87 of which previously committed to the Department of Health to remain open. Of these 148 laboratories, 34 reported seeing zero patients for the day, while the rest reported a decrease in their census," DOH said.
"Five laboratories previously committed to remain open during the 25th but did not submit any report."
Per the health department's latest bulletin, the following areas posted the most number of confirmed coronavirus patients over the past week:
- Rizal (66 new cases)
- Quezon City (50 new cases)
- Benguet (47 new cases)
- Davao City (42 new cases)
- City of Manila (35 new cases)
The department added that 80.2% of new cases were mild, while 9.9% were asymptomatic, 6.2% were critical, and 3.2% were severe.
Sunday's coronavirus update also included another 42 casualties linked to the virus, bringing its death toll to 9,109.
Minus the deaths and casualties, there are still 22,099 active cases of the disease left in the country's hospitals and quarantine centers, or 4.7% of total cases.
The Philippines' positivity rate currently stands at 6.6% based on the 11,510 number of people tested before 12 p.m. from the day before, 756 of whom tested positive in the DOH's latest update.
READ: Fact check: Palace says Philippines leads world in number of COVID-19 tests conducted
Worldwide, over 80.7 million cases have been confirmed, leading to more than 1.7 million deaths according to data from the World Health Organization.
It has been 287 days since parts of the Philippines were first placed under enhanced community quarantine.
President Rodrigo Duterte on Sunday morning ordered the extension of the ban on flights from the United Kingdom after December 31 amid mounting concerns over a new strain of coronavirus that emerged in the UK which experts fear to be more contagious than the original.
The British virus variant — which Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said "may be up to 70% more transmissible than the original version of the disease" — has already been detected in Rome, Denmark, Netherlands, Australia, and most recently in France. More than 50 countries have imposed travel restrictions on the UK.
— Franco Luna with reports from Bella Perez-Rubio
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