Palace: Positivity rate shows COVID-19 cases really declining

MANILA, Philippines — Malacañang yesterday disputed the statement of a World Health Organization (WHO) official that the drop in testing rates is likely contributing to a global decline in COVID-19 cases.

“No,” acting presidential spokesman Karlo Nograles said at a media briefing when asked if this is the situation in the Philippines.

“We can see that our positivity rate decreases. It is true that our tests are also decreasing as we see the numbers dropping in terms of active cases… but one indicator that you should look at is our positivity rate. Because the positivity rate is also going down, it also means that the trajectory for all cases is really going down,” he pointed out.

Nograles said the country’s COVID cases are already on a downward trend because of the government’s vaccination efforts and the cooperation of Filipinos who continue to observe minimum public health standards.

The Philippines has returned to low-risk classification for COVID-19 after experiencing record-breaking infections at the start of the year due to the highly transmissible Omicron variant.

“The National Capital Region and the entire Philippines is now under low-risk classification based on three metrics we use – growth in cases, average daily attack rate per 100,000 population and health system’s capacity,” Nograles explained at a press briefing on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, the OCTA Research Group said the number of people who test positive for COVID-19 in the National Capital Region has dropped to only six percent of the total tests conducted.

The region’s positivity rate – which OCTA fellow Guido David said is still considered as “moderate” – is almost within the ideal five percent or below set by the WHO.

David cited Department of Health data which logged only 398 new cases for NCR on Thursday, down from the 632 recorded the previous day. The average daily attack rate is also “moderate” at 3.45 new cases per 100,000 people, while reproduction number and health care utilization remained at “very low” levels.

He earlier projected that cases may drop to less than 200 per day by the end of the month.

Nationwide, the DOH reported 2,232 new cases, bringing the overall tally to 3,648,924.

Of the total, at least 307 are under “critical” condition, which means they “have impending or ongoing respiratory failure and are in need of mechanical ventilator or with evidence of end-organ damage with septic shock.”

The DOH also reported 1,422 patients under “severe” condition, referring to those with clinical signs of severe pneumonia or severe acute respiratory infection. – Janvic Mateo, Sheila Crisostomo