Philippines logs 15,566 new COVID-19 cases, active tally at 130k

The Department of Health (DOH) on Friday reported 15,566 new coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) infections, bringing the nationwide tally to 2,565,487, as five laboratories failed to submit data on time.

According to the DOH, the country’s active cases decreased to 130,268, the lowest since August 23.

Of this, 77.9% are mild, 15% are asymptomatic, 2.1% are severe, and 0.9% are in critical condition.

Meanwhile, total recoveries climbed to 2,396,726 with 23,483 new ones while 199 more fatalities brought the death toll to 38,493.

Forty-five duplicate cases were also removed from the total case count while 102 cases previously tagged as recovered were reclassified as fatalities.

Data also showed that the intensive care unit beds for COVID-19 patients remain at high risk with 73% of the total 4,400 ICU beds in use while 75% of the 1,500 beds in the National Capital Region (NCR) are occupied.

High risk means the occupancy rate is more than 70% but less than 85%.

Meanwhile, 64% of the 15,700 ward beds in the Philippines are being utilized while 57% of the 4,400 ward beds in NCR are in use.

The OCTA Research earlier said that the COVID-19 reproduction number in NCR continues to go down, dropping to 0.84 on Friday from 0.98 a week ago.

Reproduction number refers to the number of people that one COVID-19 case can infect. A reproduction number that is below 1 indicates that the transmission of the virus is slowing down.—AOL, GMA News