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Philippines still worst place to be amid pandemic, says Bloomberg's October report


The Philippines is still tagged as the "worst place to be" during the global health crisis after it ranked last among 53 nations, according to a Bloomberg report released on Wednesday.

Bloomberg's COVID Resilience Ranking indicated that the country gained the lowest overall resilience score, with 40.5.

In June, the country placed 52nd and dropped to 53rd in September, with a resilience score of 40.2. 

Malacañang had refuted the country's September ranking, saying that the Bloomberg report did not include all the countries in the world in the survey.

"May 194 countries po sa mundo, 53 lang ang sinurvey. Hindi tayo huli sa buong mundo, huli lang tayo sa mga pinag-aralan (There are 194 countries in the world but only 53 were surveyed. We are not the last in the world, we just ranked last among those surveyed)," presidential spokesperson Harry Roque had said.

GMA News Online sought Roque's comment on the latest report but has yet to get a response.

According to the Bloomberg article that featured the October report,  the Philippines is among the "worst on vaccine coverage" as it recorded nearly 26% of its population were fully inoculated against COVID-19.

Further, it said the Philippines' score was affected by the  imposed  restrictions on children in malls and other public spaces,  and international travel.

It also noted the Philippines' "conservative approach" in reopening the economy.

In addition, Philippines reopened more businesses such as gyms and cinemas but it is still lagging behind Asian neighbors such as Thailand and Indonesia which already allowed entry of tourists.

Cases declining

Meanwhile, Bloomberg said Philippines' COVID-19 cases have declined after reaching record-high infections in September due to the  highly infectious Delta coronavirus variant.

Those who tested positive from the virus declined significantly from nearly one in three in September to about 12%, read the article.

As of Wednesday, Philippines logged 2,768,849 total COVID-19 cases, including  2,676,349 recoveries and 42,348 deaths.

It also reported the lowest new COVID-19 cases since May.—LDF, GMA News

 

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