MANILA, Philippines — The case fatality rate (CFR) in Metro Manila is only 1.46 percent, the Department of Health (DOH) said Friday, after OCTA Research reported that CFR was 5.4 percent in the past two weeks.
“As of April 15, ang ating (our) case fatality rate sa (in the) NCR is 1.46 percent. We compute the case fatality rate based on the number of deaths from this specific disease, ‘yung (the) COVID-19, over the number of confirmed cases,” Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said in an online press briefing on Friday.
“That is based on our epidemiology concepts,” she added.
The CFR reported by the DOH is significantly lower than OCTA Research’s report of 5.4 percent CFR in Metro Manila in the past two weeks, from March 28 to April 13, almost three times the 1.82 percent case-fatality rate recorded from March 1 to March 27.
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The DOH said that it contacted OCTA to ask how the research group’s numbers came to be.
In its report, OCTA Research said the higher case fatality rate could be attributed to the overwhelmed hospital care system and the more transmissible variants of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
Meanwhile, the DOH said it calculates the CFR based on the formula stated by the World Health Organization and the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“In this formula, ALL confirmed cases, including deaths, recoveries, and active cases, are part of the denominator. This figure reflects the CFR of cumulative cases as of current date,” the DOH explained.
“To reflect fatality trends over a shorter, more recent time period, we report the average deaths which occurred per day and compared these figures to other time periods—includes active cases,” the health agency added.
As of April 15, Metro Manila has already recorded a total of 401,917 COVID-19 cases, composed of 91,388 active cases, 304,658 recoveries, and 5,871 deaths.