MANILA, Philippines — The Department of Health (DOH) reported 9,227 new COVID-19 cases on Wednesday, raising the total active coronavirus infections in the country to 116,434.
According to DOH, active cases represent 12.1 percent of all 962,307 COVID-19 cases so far recorded in the country since the start of the pandemic. Of the active infections, 98 percent are mild and asymptomatic.
Meanwhile, 19,699 new recoveries brought the total number of patients who have survived their bout against the disease to 829,608. But there were also 124 additional patients who have died, pushing the death toll to 16,265.
The DOH said recoveries and deaths account for 86.2 percent and 1.69 percent of the total caseload, respectively.
On positivity rate, the health department said 19.5 percent of the 37,235 individuals who were tested were found positive for the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19.
Twenty-six duplicate entries, including 14 recoveries, were removed from the case count, while 36 cases previously tagged as recoveries were reclassified as deaths after final validation.
The DOH said one laboratory was not operational on April 19 while eight laboratories were not able to submit their data to the COVID-19 Document Repository System.
Also on Wednesday, the DOH said the intensive care unit utilization is at the critical risk in Cagayan Valley and Central Luzon, and is high risk in Metro Manila, Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR), and Calabarzon amid the rising number of COVID-19 cases.
Meanwhile, the overall healthcare utilization is considered high risk in CAR, Cagayan Valley, and Calabarzon, and is moderate risk in Metro Manila and Central Luzon.
Government data showed that over 1.5 million doses of the more than 3 million COVID-19 vaccine doses available in the country have so far been administered, including 1.3 million doses given as the first dose. The data also showed that 209,456 individuals have so far completed their second dose of the jabs.