MANILA, Philippines — The latest COVID-19 positivity rate in Metro Manila reached a “new high” of 40 percent, a fellow at independent monitoring group OCTA Research said Wednesday.
“For the positivity rate [in the National Capital Region], we have reached a new high positivity rate yesterday. It’s the highest that we have seen so far, 40 percent,” Dr. Guido David said during a Go Negosyo forum.
“I believe this is already straining our testing capacity, our testing laboratories, we have to augment this with antigen testing, which we are in fact doing so already,” he added.
Meanwhile, the reproduction rate in NCR was recorded at around 5, according to Guido.
“We have a very high reproduction,” he noted.
The reproduction number refers to the average number of persons who can be potentially infected by the virus — the potential number of cases infected by a single positive case in a population susceptible to the infection.
The average daily attack rate (ADAR), Guido said, is at “high” as well. The ADAR refers to the percentage of an at-risk population that is infected with the virus during a specific time period.
Guido noted that the NCR’s average positivity rate for the past seven days is at a “critical level” of 25 percent.
Nevertheless, Guido said the healthcare utilization in the region is still “at a low risk” of 34 percent.
“Although it has been increasing…So the overall risk level is high for the NCR and we can see the cases did spike, it’s almost vertical and we are about essentially halfway to the effective peak of the previous surge,” he added.
On Tuesday, the Department of Health (DOH) reported 5,434 additional COVID-19 cases in the country.
Of this, 3,846 are from NCR, according to Guido’s tweet, which cited data from the DOH.
Provinces with the most new cases on 1.4.22. Data was automatically extracted from DOH DataDrop. Any discrepancies in data due to error, reporting lag etc should be addressed to DOH. @dzbb @allangatus @News5PH @dzrhnews @DZAR1026 @NewsRmn @ABSCBNNews @dwiz882 @manilabulletin pic.twitter.com/Ne7RomtN0Y
— Dr. Guido David (@iamguidodavid) January 4, 2022
Earlier, the DOH Secretary Francisco Duque III said Metro Manila is now at critical risk for COVID-19.
The DOH is also projecting the rise in COVID-19 cases to peak by the end of January, with a notice that there may be “more than the number we saw during the Delta peak.”