OCTA: Davao City still has most new COVID-19 cases

Davao City is still classified as a high-risk area for COVID-19 as it continues to log the highest number of new infections nationwide, the OCTA Research group said Tuesday.

In their latest monitoring report, the independent team of experts said Davao City logged an average of 303 new cases daily from June 29 to July 5, while its reproduction number stood at 1.23 and its ICU utilization rate was at 90%.

Also classified as high-risk areas by OCTA were the cities of Bacolod, Iloilo, General Santos, Baguio, and Tagum, which all posted reproduction numbers higher than 1, indicating sustained COVID-19 transmission.

The reproduction number refers to the number of people that each COVID-19 case can infect.

OCTA said it follows the COVID-19 risk classification system developed by Harvard Global Health Institute, Apple, Microsoft, and Bloomberg, among others. It uses four indicators: reproduction number, incidence, ICU occupancy rate, and positivity rate.

The group said the Philippines was classified as moderate risk as it averaged 5,451 daily new cases from June 29 to July 5, 3% lower than the previous week’s average.

Metro Manila was also categorized as a moderate-risk area with an average of 644 new infections per day, 5% lower than the previous week’s average.

The Department of Health earlier classified the Philippines as a low-risk area after its case growth rate and average daily attack rate decreased.

Health authorities underscored, however, that the low-risk classification must not lead to complacency in battling COVID-19.

The Philippines has logged over 1.4 million COVID-19 cases with more than 1.3 million recoveries and 25,192 deaths as of Monday afternoon.