SWS: 57% of Filipinos believe worst of COVID-19 pandemic yet to come

Image: Screenshot from sws.org.ph

MANILA, Philippines — Fifty-seven percent of Filipinos believe that the worst-case scenario of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is yet to come, the latest Social Weather Stations (SWS) survey released Tuesday showed.

According to the survey, which was conducted from July 3 to 6, this was a 10-point jump from last May’s survey results, where 47 percent of Filipinos said that the worst-case scenario of the ongoing pandemic has not yet arrived.

On the other hand, the survey showed that 35 percent of Filipinos expressed belief that the worst of the ongoing pandemic is already behind. This number fell from 44 percent compared to last May’s survey results.

The remaining eight percent of respondents, meanwhile, did not give an answer.

Most of the respondents who said that they expect that “the worse is yet to come” were from Metro Manila at 70 percent, followed by those from the Visayas with 61 percent, Balance Luzon with 56 percent, and Mindanao at 49 percent.

However, those who believe that the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic is already behind were from Mindanao with 41 percent, followed by Balance Luzon with 35 percent, the Visayas with 33 percent, and Metro Manila with 26 percent.

At present, the total number of COVID-19 cases in the country is at 265,888, with 4,630 deaths and 207,504 recoveries.

SWS said that the recently released survey was a “probability-based survey” conducted using a mobile phone and computer-assisted telephone interviewing.

A total of 1,555 working Filipinos (aged 18 years old and above) participated in the survey.

The pollster also said that the survey had sampling error margins of ±2 percent for national percentages, ±6 percent for Metro Manila, ±5 percent for Balance Luzon, ±5 percent for the Visayas, and ±5 percent for Mindanao.

EDV