MANILA, Philippines — The Department of Health (DOH) on Monday said there is already community transmission of the COVID-19 Delta variant “observed” in the National Capital Region (NCR) and Calabarzon but added that “further evidence” is still needed to confirm it.
“Definitely, I can tell all of you, Region 4A and NCR na nandiyan na po, we can observe that already. Although we need further evidence, but there is community transmission already in these areas,” Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said in an online media briefing Monday.
(Definitely, I can tell all of you, Region 4A and NCR already have that, we can observe that already. Although we need further evidence, there is community transmission already in these areas.)
“So currently, we have seen and observed, especially in NCR and Region 4A, na talagang mukhang community transmission na ito. Nakita natin na wala nang link ang mga kaso sa bawa’t isa. We are seeing a clustering of cases in this two big regions kaya iyan po ay isang bagay na pinagtutuunan natin ng pansin sa ngayon,” she added.
(So currently, we have seen and observed, especially in NCR and Region 4A, that this looks like this is community transmission already. We have seen that the cases have no link with each other. We are seeing a clustering of cases in this two big regions; that’s why we are focusing on this.)
“For us to be able to pronounce or to say and confirm that there is community transmission, we need further evidence. Ang ating pagde-detect ng mga variants ay limitado po tayo sa ngayon (Our capacity to detect variants is still limited),” she further said.
Over the weekend, the Philippine Genome Centre (PGC) said the Philippines now has community transmission of the COVID-19 Delta variant.
While Vergeire acknowledged this, she said the DOH needs “enough evidence” to make an official declaration.
READ: PGC results show Delta variant community transmission in PH–DOH
“The assumption is there. Lahat ng aksyon natin ay (All of our actions are) geared towards that level of community transmission already,” she said.
“But as to confirming it, kailangan kasi namin ng ebidensya (we need evidence) because this is a a classification. This is a technical thing when we classify and announce na community transmission na talaga, kasi kailangan mo ng ebidensya yan (because we need evidence there),” she added.