MANILA, Philippines — Among factors that would help the Philippines flatten its COVID-19 curve is for critical care utilization rate nationwide to reach less than 30 percent, the Department of Health (DOH) said Wednesday.
“The ideal number would be that the utilization is less than 30 percent because if you say that we are, for example, the Philippines right now is at 46 percent, meaning, 46 percent of all of these critical care components of the system is being utilized so you only have 54 percent available for the rest of the citizens,” DOH spokesperson Ma. Rosario Vergeire said in an interview over ABS-CBN News Channel.
“If you have less than 30 percent of these critical care components being utilized, you can say that the health care system is being able to manage the situation,” she added.
A continuous dip in the number of cases is also an indicator that the country has flattened its COVID-19 curve, Vergeire added.
“Maybe when we reach that part where we already have lowered down the critical care utilization, our health systems being able to accommodate patients, the utilization is lower than warning zone already, maybe if the number of cases continues to decrease and the growth rate of cases continue to decrease for two incubation periods and that is 28 days for the whole country, and then we can say, that is the point where we can say that we have reached that objective of flattening the curve,” she explained.
While the situation is improving, the DOH has said there is no certainty if the country’s epidemic curve of COVID-19 has already flattened and warned the public against complacency.
“Nothing’s certain, you cannot really say when and as to a certain period of time that the Department of Health can tell you that the curve will flatten,” Vergeire said.
A research group from the University of the Philippines reported that the COVID-19 infections of the country have already flattened noting the low number of cases’ reproduction numbers.