PH’s active COVID-19 cases reach 208,164 as 32,246 more contract virus

MANILA, Philippines — Current active COVID-19 cases nationwide jumped to 208,164 as the Department of Health (DOH) reported Wednesday that 32,246 more people in the country contacted the SARS-CoV-2 virus.

This is the second-highest daily rise yet for the Philippines since the pandemic hit in 2020, after the record 33,169 new COVID-19 cases posted on January 10.

Of the currently sick, DOH said the majority or 97.8 percent have mild or no symptoms. Specifically, 197,091 people have mild symptoms, 6,435 have no symptoms (asymptomatic), 2,872 have moderate symptoms, and 1,468 have severe symptoms while 298 are considered critical cases.

Based on the DOH’s latest report, 99 percent or 31,793 of the fresh infections were logged within the last 14 days. It also showed that in the recent two weeks, Metro Manila is again the top region that posted the highest number of new cases at 17,902 (56 percent), trailed by Region 4-A with 6,838 (22 percent), and Region 3 with 3,268 (10 percent).

The positivity rate, on the other hand, was at 45.7 percent, according to the health agency, which also noted that a total of 63,903 tests were conducted on January 10.

The DOH further reported on Wednesday the recovery of 5,063 coronavirus patients, as well as the passing of an additional 144 patients. With these numbers, the sum of recoveries and deaths stood at 2,797,816 and 52,654 as of January 12.

Meanwhile, the DOH again noted the failure of several laboratories that conducted coronavirus tests to submit data on time. Particularly, it said that 11 laboratories were not able to submit data to the COVID-19 Document Repository System on tests they performed on January 10.

“Based on data in the last 14 days, the 11 labs contribute, on average, 3.3% of samples tested and 4.5% of positive individuals,” the DOH explained.

The health agency likewise said that 143 duplicates have been removed from the COVID-19 tally, including 118 cases tagged as recoveries and two cases labeled as fatalities.

Moreover, the DOH said that 125 cases that were previously marked as recoveries have been reclassified as death cases after final validation.

SARS-CoV-2 is the latest coronavirus strain first detected in China in late 2019. It causes severe respiratory illness COVID-19. It has also undergone a number of mutations since 2020 that resulted in various variants which include Delta and Omicron – said to be the most contagious of all.

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