MANILA, Philippines — The Philippines has recorded a total of 17,224 coronavirus disease (COVID-19) cases but only 252 are recent or “fresh cases” of the disease, the Department of Health (DOH) said Saturday.
Of the 17,224, the total reported cases were 590 with 338 “late cases” or backlog data from the DOH.
The latest data from the DOH also showed a total of 3,808 recoveries with 88 new recoveries.
Meanwhile, eight more deaths because of COVID-19 were documented, raising the total to 950 deaths.
The DOH previously said it will release separate data on fresh COVID-19 infections and on the backlog of cases so that there is no impression that COVID-19 cases are increasing in the country.
The coronavirus disease is a respiratory ailment that is caused by the novel coronavirus or SARS-CoV-2, which originated in Wuhan City in China’s Hubei Province in late 2019.
The new coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms such as fever or cough for most people but it can cause severe illness such as pneumonia on older people and those with existing health problems.
Over 5.9 million COVID-19 cases had been recorded worldwide. This includes more than 360,000 deaths and about 2.4 million recoveries.