Philippines records 17,411 new COVID-19 cases

Suspected COVID-19 patients and relatives rest in a parking lot turned into a covid ward outside a hospital in Biñan town, Laguna province south of Manila on September 6, 2021, with record infections fuelled by the hyper-contagious Delta variant. (Photo by Maria Tan / AFP)

MANILA, Philippines — The SARS-CoV-2 virus has infected 17,411 more individuals, raising the number of the country’s active COVID-19 cases to 165,790 as of Thursday.

The active cases compose 6.8 percent of the total 2,434,753 confirmed COVID-19 cases in the country. Meanwhile, another 14,090 patients have recovered, taking the total number of COVID-19 survivors to 2,231,558. Meanwhile, a total of 177 additional patients who have died brought the country’s death count to 37,405.

Some 24.6 percent of 71,010 individuals who were tested for the virus were found positive on Tuesday, according to the Department of Health.

The DOH said three laboratories were not able to submit their data to the COVID-19 Document Repository System. The non-reporting laboratories contribute 0.3 percent of samples tested and 0.3 percent of positive individuals on average in the last 14 days.

The DOH removed 77 duplicate entries, including 55 recoveries, from the total case count. Eighty-eight cases that were initially tagged as recoveries were reclassified as deaths after final validation.

Health Secretary Francisco Duque III earlier noted that there are indications showing that COVID-19 infections nationwide may be on a downward trend. He said that the recent daily cases were lower than over 20,000 new cases being recorded daily in the past weeks.

/MUF