Concepcion expects COVID-19 cases to stabilize as mobility lessens in 1st quarter of 2022

The number of COVID-19 cases in the country may stabilize as mobility decreases in the first quarter of 2022, Presidential Adviser for Entrepreneurship Joey Concepcion said Wednesday.

“Remember, we’re approaching now the first quarter of the year and that’s going to be the slowest quarter of the year. There will be lesser mobility because wala nang pera ang mga tao kasi ginastos na nila,” Concepcion told CNN Philippines.

“So I expect cases will be muted or at least stabilize if Omicron has not hit the land yet,” he added.

He stressed that the public should not panic because a lot of Filipinos have been vaccinated against the illness.

The OCTA Research group earlier warned that the spike of cases in the National Capital Region could be more than just a holiday uptick.

According to Concepcion, authorities should monitor whether those that yield positive results are vaccinated or unvaccinated.

“if they’re fully vaccinated, we expect that they will be getting well at home and not the hospitals. So we should monitor the hospitals, is there an uptick in hospital capacity right now… that should be our benchmark,” he said.

Data from the Department of Health showed that the nationwide health system is still low with 18% of intensive care unit beds are occupied and 10% mechanical ventilators in use.

In the National Capital Region, 21% of ICU beds are in use while 12% of ventilators are utilized.

Despite this, the Private Hospitals Associations of the Philippines Inc. have said that private hospitals felt a slight increase in COVID-19 cases in their facilities.

Meanwhile, Concepcion said there is no need to lower the alert level to 1.

“The businesses have definitely recovered in the last quarter, everybody was extremely happy. The bounce back was about 80% of pre-pandemic sales so that’s great,” he said.

“And what’s more important is we sustain this. We have to keep the economy open, both the micro-small and medium enterprises cannot afford lockdown,” he added.—AOL, GMA News