DOH reports only 10 cases of death due to COVID-19

This file photo shows funeral home workers in protective suits carrying a body during the start of a lockdown due to a rise in COVID cases in the city of Navotas, Manila, Philippines on Thursday, July 16, 2020. INQUIRER FILES

MANILA, Philippines — The Department of Health (DOH) on Tuesday reported just 10 cases of death due to COVID-19 – nine within this month and one in October. The death toll stood at 50,351 as of December 14.

The DOH explained that the October death case was only included in the latest bulletin because of the “late encoding of death information to COVIDKaya.”

According to DOH, the current tally of COVID-19 fatalities accounts for 1.77 percent of the total 2,836,868 confirmed coronavirus infections in the country since 2020.

Tuesday’s COVID update of DOH also disclosed that the number of people still sick due to the coronavirus decreased to 10,526 after 780 patients recovered from the illness, boosting total recoveries to  2,775,991.

Further, the health agency said the Philippines’ coronavirus positivity rate hit its lowest on Tuesday at 0.9.

But the DOH noted, 12 laboratories — which contribute, on average, 1.5 percent of samples tested and 2.6 percent of positive results — were not able to submit their data.

There was also a relatively low health care utilization rate recorded nationwide as COVID-19 patients use only 23 percent of intensive care unit (ICU) beds, 24 percent of isolation beds, 12 percent of ward beds, and 13 percent of ventilators, based on the latest bulletin of DOH.

In Metro Manila, the DOH said occupied ICU beds for coronavirus patients were at 24 percent while isolation beds use were at 19 percent, ward beds at 17 percent, and ventilators at 16 percent.

Globally, COVID-19 hit 270,822,914 people and killed 5,312,924 as of December 14, according to the Johns Hopkins University coronavirus tracker.

KGA