DOH: Late reports due to COVID-19 patients ‘misdeclaration’ of onset of illness

MANILA, Philippines — The “misdeclaration” by patients of the date of the onset of their illness was the main reason why few coronavirus disease (COVID-19) infections were reported months since they happened, the Department of Health (DOH) said Wednesday.

In an online media forum, Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said the agency recognizes the “gap” in their information system but noted they are continuously working to make it more timely, accurate, and complete.

“Ang usual reason kung bakit nagkakaroon ng ganyang paisa-isang late reports would be the misdeclaration of the onset of illness ng mga pasyente,” Vergeire said.

(The usual reason why there are still late reports would be the patients’ misdeclaration of the onset of illness.)

The DOH has been reporting a number of COVID-19 cases that happened as far back as March and April.

Of the 2,025 new cases reported Tuesday, 1,641 occurred in the last two weeks (Sept 16 to Sept. 29), 173 occurred from Sept. 1 to Sept.15, 180 in August, 16 in July, 3 in June, 2 in May, 9 in April and 1 in March.

These late cases, however, are somehow “acceptable” considering that there are thousands of Disease Reporting Units validating each COVID-19 case Vergeire noted.

She added that each case should be reported however late they were validated as they could affect health authorities’ data analysis.

“Kahit gaano kalate ‘yan, kailangan palitan natin ‘yan dahil it would really have an implication kapag dumami ‘yung mga ganyang errors. Magkakaroon ‘yan ng implikasyon sa analysis natin ng data,” Vergeire said.

(No matter how late these reports are, we need to record them as these will have an implication if there are many errors. This will have an implication on our data analysis.)

“Hopefully in the coming weeks mawawala at talagang hindi na tayo makakita ng mga ganito pero lagi naman nating sinasabi na wala namang 100 percent information system. Marami talagang mga ganito na pahabol, mga hindi nairecord ang Disease Reporting Units,” she added.

(Hopefully in the coming weeks, we will no longer see these. But there is no 100 percent information system. There is a lot that was recorded in the Disease Reporting Units.)

“With all of our thousands of Disease Reporting Units, itong mga isa, dalawa, tatlo na maireport natin in the previous months ay isang bagay na acceptable for an information system but of course for us, we would like that all will be timely and complete eventually,” the official went on.

Currently, there are 309,303 confirmed COVID-19 cases nationwide, of this number, 50,925 or 16 percent are active cases or currently ill patients.

Total recoveries are currently at 252,930 while the death toll stands at 5,448.

/MUF