Cebu City in midst of its ‘worst’ COVID-19 surge, says OCTA

The OCTA Research team on Sunday said Cebu City is in the midst of its "worst" COVID-19 surge.

In its August 8 report, the group said Cebu City's seven-day average of new COVID-19 cases rose from 223 from the previous week to 271 for the period of August 1 to 7—a 22% increase.

OCTA said this is higher than the peak of the surge in February 20 when the city reported 266 new COVID-19 infections.

However, the group added, the reproduction number in Cebu City decreased to 1.51 from the previous week's value of 1.69 and from the "peak reproduction number during this current surge" of 1.9 on July 22, 2021.

"The decrease in reproduction number indicates the pandemic in Cebu City may be decelerating," it said.

The reproduction number, which ideally should be lower than 1, refers to the average number of people that one COVID-19 patient can infect, while the positivity rate should be equal to or lower than 5%, according to the World Health Organization.

OCTA said the goal is to strictly implement the current measures and interventions to further decrease the reproduction number, "eventually causing the number of daily new COVID-19 cases to decrease."

The group said the city's positivity rate was at 19%, while the average daily attack rate was at 26.35%, which is at critical level.

Meanwhile, hospital bed occupancy in the city was moderate at 62%, while its intensive care unit bed occupancy remained high at 81%.

Cebu City is under modified enhanced community quarantine until August 15. — BM, GMA News