MANILA, Philippines — Metro Manila's COVID-19 reproduction number — a term that refers to the number of persons a COVID-19 positive individual can infect — now stands at 1.05, indicating that Metro Manila's low-risk status may only lead to a "weak surge" in COVID-19 cases at worst, the OCTA Research Group said Tuesday.
In an advisory issued Tuesday morning, OCTA Research fellow Guido David said that a reproduction number above 1 does not necessarily mean that COVID-19 cases will surge.
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"Overall, NCR remained at low-risk. Over the next few weeks, the best-case scenario is status quo, while the worst-case scenario, based on current data, is a weak surge in COVID-19 cases," David said.
Other figures are also encouraging. According to David, the average daily attack rate, which tallies the number of infections per 100 people, remained very law at 0.52 as of May 23. The daily positivity rate was at 1.2% over an average of 11,319 tests per day, while hospital care utilization for COVID-19 was at 21%.
David was also careful to point out that the last two times the reproduction number increased to more than 1 were during the start of the Omicron and Delta surges in December 24 and July 15, 2021.
This comes after the Department of Health confirmed the local transmission of the BA.2.12.1 Omicron sub-variant in the country, triggering anxieties of yet another uptick in coronavirus cases.
Though the country is still shielded by a surge of magnitude by its vaccinated population, the government's Vaccine Expert Panel took the position that the uptick could translate to up to as high as over 500 cases per day in the worst case scenario.
The DOH has recorded more than 3.68 million COVID-19 cases since the pandemic started in 2020. — Franco Luna