Mindanao cities may shift to moderate risk – OCTA

MANILA, Philippines — A majority of highly urbanized cities in Mindanao may be classified as moderate risk for COVID-19 next week, according to the OCTA Research Group.

OCTA fellow Guido David said only Cotabato and Iligan were at moderate risk as of Wednesday.

Butuan, Cagayan de Oro, Davao, General Santos and Zamboanga remained at high risk despite the downward trend in new cases.

David said Cotabato and Iligan have a moderate average daily attack rate of less than 10 new cases per 100,000 people. The rest have high ADARs.

OCTA said the seven cities have low or “very low” reproduction numbers of less than 1.0 while their positivity rates are 25 percent or higher, which it considers as “very high.”

The reproduction number refers to those who can be infected by a COVID-positive person while positivity rate is the percentage of those found infected out of those tested.

Healthcare utilization in Iligan was a very low 28 percent, a low 42 percent in General Santos and moderate in the rest of the cities.

Among provinces nationwide, David said only Guimaras in Western Visayas recorded a positive growth rate in new cases.

The ADAR and healthcare utilization in the province were both moderate at 9.54 and 56 percent, respectively.

In Luzon, David said Quezon province has been downgraded to low risk after its ADAR dropped to 1.65 daily new cases per 100,000 people.

Batangas, Cavite, Laguna and Rizal remain at moderate risk mainly due to high positivity rates.

In Cagayan Valley, 87 more cases of the highly transmissible Omicron variant have been detected, the Department of Health (DOH) regional office reported.

Health authorities said 85 are local cases and two are returning overseas Filipino workers.

The Regional Epidemiology and Surveillance Unit said there are now 101 Omicron cases in the region.

The DOH said new COVID cases in Cagayan Valley continued to decline except in Batanes. Cagayan Valley, which remains under Alert Level 3, recorded 1,985 active cases yesterday.