WHO Philippines echoes possible COVID-19 surge by mid-May if health protocols are not followed

The World Health Organization (WHO) on Monday backed the Department of Health's (DOH) warning that the country may experience another surge in COVID-19 infections by mid-May if the minimum public health standards (MPHS) are ignored.

Asked during the Laging Handa briefing if he believes the Philippines would see another increase of COVID-19 cases next month if the compliance to health protocols continues to decline, WHO Representative to the Philippines Dr. Rajendra Yadav said, “Yes, I have seen those numbers. So, we have to prove those numbers wrong and that’s the challenge we face.”

“If we relax our guards, if we relax our defenses, then yes, it’s possible to get to those numbers,” he added.

The DOH on Thursday said that a 50% decrease in the compliance of MPHS in the National Capital Region (NCR) may result in 25,000 to 60,000 new COVID-19 cases per day next month, citing the Susceptible-Exposed-Infectious-Recovered with Vaccination and Reinfection (SVEIR) model used by the sub-Technical Working Group on Data Analytics (sTWG DA) and the Feasibility Analysis of Syndromic Surveillance using Spatio-temporal Epidemiological Modeler for Early Detection of Diseases (FASSSTER) Team.

Based on the models, a 20% decrease in MPHS compliance nationwide may lead to around 34,788 active COVID-19 cases by mid-May. According to the DOH, over 564 of these cases could be classified as severe and 267 as critical.

Meanwhile, a 30% decrease in MPHS compliance might increase the cases further, possibly to as high as 300,000 over the same period.

Yadav, however, explained that “only time will tell” whether there will be a surge again, considering the increased mobility of the public especially during the Holy Week.

“Whether this social mixing and increased mobility during Easter will cause increasing cases depends on whether people wore masks and avoided crowds and poorly ventilated places. Also, whether we are testing enough people,” he said.

Yadav also called on the government not to rely too much on the number of cases but rather focus on increasing their COVID-19 vaccination drive to get more than 70% of its target population inoculated against the viral disease.

He also appealed to Filipinos to urge the local chief executives themselves to ramp up the vaccination especially in areas with low vaccination rate, stressing that “no one is safe unless everyone is safe.”

In contrast to the original target of fully vaccinating at least 90 million Filipinos by the end of President Rodrigo Duterte's term on June 30, 2022, National Vaccination Operations Center (NVOC) chairperson Dr. Myrna Cabotaje said on Sunday that they would already be “happy” if they reach 77 million by then.

Based on the latest data, at least 66.7 million Filipinos are already fully vaccinated against COVID-19. Meanwhile, some 12.5 million have received their first booster dose.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has recently granted the emergency use authorization for the second booster shot for the senior citizens, the immunocompromised, and frontline health frontliners.

The Philippines recorded 195 additional cases of COVID-19 on Sunday, the lowest daily tally in nearly four months since December last year.

This drove the total caseload to 3.683 million, which includes 3.602 recoveries, and 59,969 deaths. —KBK, GMA News