This file photo shows a worker in a protective suit, used due to the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak, waiting outside the crematorium facility as the cremation process takes some two hours in Manila on April 29, 2020. (Photo by Maria TAN / AFP FILE)
MANILA, Philippines — The Department of Health (DOH) on Wednesday reported 28 new COVID-19 deaths, raising the country’s death toll to 51,241.
However, only seven or 25 percent of the new deaths occurred in December, said the DOH. The other two were reported in November, another four in October, nine in September, one in August, and two in July.
Three other deaths were also recorded from last year, two of which were in July 2020 and one in June 2020.
The DOH earlier explained that delays in the reporting of COVID-19 deaths are due to the late encoding of death information to the DOH’s COVIDKaya.
The current death toll, meanwhile, still accounts for 1.80 percent of the total 2,839,790 confirmed COVID-19 cases in the country.
Active infections, on the other hand, have passed the 10,000-mark at 10,418, after the DOH reported its highest number of daily cases since Nov. 27.
The positivity rate was also raised to 4.5 percent, the rate since Nov. 13.
A relatively low health care utilization rate, however, continues to be recorded by the DOH nationwide with only 20 percent of ICU beds, 23 percent of isolation beds, 11 percent of ward beds, and 12 percent of ventilators currently in use.
The same goes for Metro Manila, where occupied ICU beds are currently at 23 percent, isolation beds at 21 percent, ward beds at 17 percent, and 14 percent for ventilators.
As of writing, worldwide deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins University COVID-19 tracker, number 5,414,872, while infections are at 282,848,872.