The Health Agency reports 240 cases today, with 36 added deaths. The surprise? NCR owned more than half of the daily cases.

While still considered low by other standards, the dropping of several minimum health standards and the relatively low first boosters (32%) of the NCR shows the vulnerability of a dense region for resurgence of cases anytime.

Mega Manila posted 126 new cases today, with five LGUs reporting double digits. These were: City of Manila 25, Pasay City 15, Parañaque 13, Makati 12, and Pasig 10. Other LGUs reported single digit with 2 LGUs reporting zero covid. The latter were, Malabon and Pateros.

Outside of NCR, only the province of Cavite posted double digit numbers with 13 cases today.

The Health Agency announces 184 new cases with 38 added deaths today. Of the 184 cases, 37% belonged to the epicenter – NCR. The 7-day average positivity rate remains at 1.3%.

In the NCR, only one LGU had double digits, with 22 cases. This belonged to Quezon City, which accounted for almost 1/3 of the cases in Mega Manila alone. All other LGUs continued to report single digits, with five LGUs in NCR having zero covid. They were: Muntinlupa, Marikina, Navotas, San Juan, and Pateros.

Outside of NCR, the province of Cavite had 10 cases and was the only province with double digit count.

The Health Agency announces 193 new cases and 52 added deaths for today. More than 40% of today’s cases are from the epicenter – Mega Manila – with 78 cases.

Only three LGUs in the NCR report double digits. They are: Manila 13, and Quezon City and Parañaque with 10 apiece. All the other LGUs reported single digits with three LGUs – Malabon, San Juan and Pateros – having zero covid today.

Cebu had 10 cases today – 8 in the province and 2 in Cebu City.

The Health Agency announces 195 cases today with 30 added deaths. While the cases may not seem high, one should interpret the data with caution as some areas are seeing increasing cases.

In NCR, Quezon City had 42 cases. This meant that 22% of the country’s total cases today was from QC alone. All other LGUs in NCR had single digit numbers, with two LGUs reporting zero covid. The latter were: San Juan and Pateros.

Only one province outside of NCR had double digits today – Cavite with 10 cases.

The Health Agency announced 123 new cases and 1 added death today. The low Tuesday does not reflect the actual number of cases the Philippines has, as the Department of Health’s data lags behind that of the local government units (LGUs). Only 38 cases were from the National Capital Region today.

None of the LGUs in NCR reported double digits today (strangely low…like a calm before the storm). The City of Manila had the most cases at 7, while Caloocan City and Pasay City were second with 6 each. Four LGUs reported zero COVID in Mega Manila today. They were: Valenzuela, Malabon, San Juan and Pateros.

Outside of NCR, there were also low cases in the provinces as all provinces and HUCs (highly urbanized cities) reported single digit numbers.

Again, this data should be taken with caution because this is data from a Sunday (low day for testing) and that many people with mild symptoms do not test. Even if they do, majority do antigen testing, which is not counted in the daily national tally for COVID19.

Please do not become complacent of the situation. While the variants of omicron may be mild, the vulnerable and those who are unvaccinated or partially vaccinated are at higher risk for developing severe disease.

Note that the percentage of positives are up today (at around 1.4%) compared to yesterday’s 1.1%. This means that we will most likely see a bump up in the numbers in the subsequent days.

The Health Agency’s weekly summary showed 1465 new cases the week of April 18-24, 2022 or an average of 209 cases a day. This was a decline of 12% of cases from the previous week.

Now here’s the part we missed. Healthcare utilization for non ICU beds decreased from 4164 out of 24,645 bed the week of April 11-17 to 4112 out of 24,309 beds the week of April 18-24. Notice that there was no movement in over-all utilization for non ICU beds at 16.9%.

On the other hand, ICU bed utilization on April 11-17 was 450 out of 2,842 ICU beds but up at 479 out of 2,841 ICU beds for the week of April 18-24. This meant that ICU bed utilization was up from 15.8% to 16.9%. While still considered very low risk (<20%), notice that the severe and critical admissions are up from 664 the week of April 11-17 to 726 the week of April 18-24. According the Health Agency, there was only ONE severe and critical case from April 11 – 17. And based on today’s bulletin, there were ZERO severe and critical cases from April 18-24. So what accounts for the jump in severe and critical admissions AND the jump in ICU bed utilization?

Total target population fully vaccinated is slightly up from 74.28% to 74.98% as a little more than 880,000 are added to the fully vaccinated list. A2 coverage (senior citizens) is also up from 76.14% to 76.35% this week. Individuals who had ONE additional booster was almost 300,000 the week of April 16-22 or almost twice that of the previous week.

There were more deaths the week of April 18-24 as 213 deaths were added to the list, compared to the week of April 11-17 where 200 deaths were announced.

The Health Agency announces 213 new cases and 12 added deaths today. The NCR led the haul with more than 46% of today’s cases. The week starts off with a positivity rate of 1.1% or a paltry 151 positive from 13,734 individuals tested yesterday.

Three LGUs in NCR had double digits – Makati (17), Manila (16) and Quezon City (13). While the rest had single digits, two LGUs reported zero covid – Pateros and Marikina.

Outside NCR, only one province reported double digits – Cavite with 13.

The Health Agency announces 205 new cases with 3 added deaths today. NCR took the haul with more than 46% of the total cases.

Three LGUs in NCR reported double digits with Pasay City reporting 20 cases, Quezon City 15 and Manila 13. Other LGUs in Mega Manila had single digit numbers with 2 LGUs having zero covid – Pateros and Navotas.

Outside of NCR, the provinces of Cavite (14) and Rizal (12) were the only provinces with double digit cases today.

THE WEEK IN REVIEW

The Philippines continues to see a slight decline in cases, although the decrease has considerably slowed down. This week ends with an average of 210 cases daily or around 1.89 cases per million (per capita). The reader is cautioned to interpret this data carefully because (1) many do not use RT-PCR for testing and (2) the health agency does not include RAT (rapid antigen test) in the daily count.

A good indicator though is the healthcare utilization rate which is at a very low risk status. Positivity rate also low at 1.4% (based on the Department of Health COVID19 tracker).

The death rates are also down, although the past several days, we’ve had more than 60 deaths daily (most likely due to backlog reports). At the rate the health agency reports deaths, it’s difficult to make heads or tails on correlating the deaths with the number of daily (or even weekly) cases in the pandemic.

All East Asian nations are seeing a lowering of cases, except for Taiwan and China.

Based on number of cases, South Korea continues to lead the region, however, with a significant drop in the daily cases reported. Japan continued to report more than 40,000 daily cases and seems to be unable to shake off the numbers. China is now in third spot as Vietnam clears the bar and drops to an average of 20,000 daily cases.

In terms of number of cases per capita, South Korea remains on top with 1720 cases per million people, while Singapore is in second with 572 per million. Brunei, which is seeing a daily average of 177 cases per day based on the 7 day average) is up in third with 400 cases per million population. The Philippines remains at the lowest rung with 1.89 cases per million population.

Effective reproduction rate shows that Taiwan’s Rt is up at 1.77. This means that Taiwan has not yet peaked and will most likely see more cases in the coming weeks. This is the same story as China whose Rt is at 1.20 (as of April 19, 2022). With the recent upswing of cases in Beijing, the COVID19 outbreak in China may be quite challenging to control. The Rt of the Philippine is at 0.78 (+/- 0.05), indicating that we still have the potential to bring down the cases but the decline will significantly slow down over the new weeks. Indonesia’s Rt is at 0.40, indicating a continued significant decrease in cases in the upcoming week as the Omicron wave comes to an end as well.

The Health Agency announces 210 new cases and added 61 deaths (these backlog reports on deaths should be given more attention because it seems that we have never ending reports on deaths) today.

NCR accounted for 35% of the cases for the country with three LGUs reporting double digits. They were: Quezon City and the City of Manila with 13 apiece and Makati with 11. Other LGUs have single digits with Pateros as the lone LGU with zero covid.

Outside of NCR, only one province reported double digits – Cavite with 12 cases.

The Health Agency announces 230 new cases today together with 62 added deaths. The 7-day positivity rate bumps up by 0.1% to 1.4%. The NCR owned 36% of today’s cases.

Three LGUs in Mega Manila led the haul today with double digits. They were: City of Manila 19, Quezon City 15, and Caloocan City 13. The rest of the LGUs reported single digit or had zero covid. Those with zero covid in NCR were: Taguig, Valenzuela and Marikina City.

Outside of NCR, the following provinces reported double digits: Batangas 15, Cavite 13, and Rizal 11. The haul in CALABARZON of 47 cases, plus Mega Manila’s 83 accounted for 57% of the country’s total cases for the day.

While today had some good news with only 134 new cases, the number of deaths (which are lagging reports) are up at 66, pushing the total number of deaths due to COVID19 past the 60,000 mark.

The NCR had 53 cases, accounting for 40% of the total cases in the country today. Only one LGU had double digit numbers – Makati City – which reported 10 cases. While the rest of the LGUs in Mega Manila had single digit numbers, 4 of the LGUs reported zero covid. The latter were: Taguig, Malabon, Navotas and Pateros.

Outside of NCR, the following provinces had double digits: Cavite 11, Laguna 10, and Batangas 13.

This is the opportune time to get your boosters (if you still have not had even the first booster).