EASED | Foreign tourists visit Fort Santiago in Intramuros, Manila. The government has lifted the ban on the entry of unvaccinated foreigners. (Photo by RICHARD A. REYES / Philippine Daily Inquirer)
MANILA, Philippines — Maria Rosario Vergeire, the officer in charge of the Department of Health (DOH), said on Tuesday that she could not confidently declare that COVID-19 was nearing endemicity in the country, citing waning population immunity due to low booster coverage and subvariants.
“We can say, yes, endemicity will come soon. But now, it’s quite uncertain because of the [low] immunity we are talking about,” she said in a press briefing.
Vergeire was reacting to a statement made earlier in the day by infectious diseases expert Dr. Edsel Salvana that COVID-19 was nearing the endemic phase in the country due to the fluctuating trend of case infections. Salvana is a member of the DOH’s technical advisory group for COVID-19.
But she said she agreed with Salvana in the sense that COVID-19 numbers were becoming “more acceptable to society” because people have a better grasp of how to manage the virus and were not panicking over an increase in cases.
A disease is considered endemic if it is limited to a certain area and transmission rates are predictable.
In recent months, however, new coronavirus strains identified to be highly immune-escaping and more contagious have been detected in the country.
The latest DOH data showed that all areas nationwide were experiencing an uptick in COVID-19 cases in recent days after showing a declining or plateauing trend. Last week, infections went up again after dropping to less than 1,000 daily cases in the first week of November.
Salvana earlier said that with cases in the country fluctuating as COVID-19 becomes endemic, the government’s pandemic response and management would be more and more focused on keeping healthcare utilization rate low.