DOH pushes for daily logging of time-based recoveries

The Department of Health (DOH) will now push for the daily logging of time-based recoveries of COVID-19 patients, Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said Tuesday.

In an interview with Dobol B TV, Vergeire explained that the huge number of COVID-19 recoveries on Monday and in the last two Sundays were due to the DOH’s time-based logging mechanism which they release every week.

Vergeire disclosed that Health Secretary Francisco Duque III instructed them to give a “more comprehensive” report on the recoveries in DOH’s daily COVID-19 case bulletin.

“Gusto niya araw-araw na po namin gagawin at ilalabaas ‘to kaya nag-umpisa po tayo kahapon. Makikita natin, we had 9,266 that is for yesterday po na recoveries,” she said.

(He wanted to release the time-based recoveries data every day that is why we started yesterday. We can see that we had 9,266 recoveries yesterday.)

Under the time-based logging mechanism, Vergeire explained that the surveillance units of the DOH track the timeline of the COVID-19 patients' cases starting from the day they tested positive or the day they experienced symptoms. After which, they will determine whether the COVID-19 patients were admitted or they perished from the disease.

“Ang ginagawa nating time-based logging for recoveries, we do it weekly, kaya napapansin niyo tuwing linggo malaki po katulad last Sunday, (more than) 72,000,” Vergeire said.

(We do the time-based logging of recoveries weekly. That is why we can observe that the number of recoveries every Sunday is very huge. Last Sunday, we had more than 72,000.)

“Kung ‘di sila deaths or ‘di sila admitted and lahat po ng walang outcomes na ‘yon, we tag them as recovered. We call it time-based recoveries,” Vergeire said.

(If the COVID-19 patient is not classified as death or if he was not admitted, then we tag them as recovered. We call it time-based recoveries.)

The DOH official admitted that the shortcomings in the daily case bulletin reporting was due to the “weakness of the information systems” but she maintained that the government is being “transparent” in reporting all COVID-19 data in the country.

“Sana po maintindihan ng ating mga kababayan na, we are transparent with our numbers, with the number of recoveries, with the number of deaths, with the number of cases. Kung ano po ang pumapasok sa aming mga datos ‘yon po ang binibigay namin araw-araw nililinis lang po namin,” she said.

(We ask for the understanding of the public that we are being transparent with our numbers, with the number of recoveries, with the number of deaths, with the number of cases. We report all the data that are coming to us every day. We are just verifying it.)

On Monday, the DOH reported 9,266 COVID-19 recoveries which is relatively higher than the usual three-digit daily recoveries that they report.

In the last two Sundays, the Philippines had tallied 72,607 recoveries (April 18) and 55,204 recovered patients (April 11). — RSJ, GMA News