With 33,169 new cases, DOH reports record tally for third straight day

MANILA, Philippines — The Philippines on Monday reported a record number of COVID-19 infections for a third consecutive day, registering 33,169 additional cases.

Monday’s new cases follow the previous record of 28,707 cases logged on Sunday. On Saturday, the country registered 26,458 infections.

The new infections brought the total number of COVID-19 cases to nearly three million.

Ninety-nine percent of the newly-reported cases occurred from December 28 to January 10, the Department of Health said. More than half of the cases were from Metro Manila.

The positivity rate was 46% out of 73,344 tests. This was way above the 5-percent threshold of the World Health Organization for opening economies.

According to the DOH, 10 testing laboratories, which contribute 6.2 percent of samples tested, were not able to submit their data.

The department also reported 145 additional fatalities, raising the death toll to 52,293.

Meanwhile, recoveries increased by 3,725 for a total of 2,788,711.

There are currently 157,526 active cases, which represent 5.3% of the confirmed total infections.

The surge in infections, which the government has attributed to increased mobility and the presence of the Omicron variant, is threatening to overwhelm the country’s health system anew.

No recommendation for Alert Level 4

• There is no recommendation yet to put Metro Manila under an even stricter Alert Level 4, the Department of the Interior and Local Government said. 
• The directive to shorten the quarantine and isolation period of healthcare workers will endanger medical frontliners and will not solve a severely lacking workforce, the Filipino Nurses United said.