Over 8,000 new COVID-19 cases for third day; death toll hits 28,000

The Philippines recorded more than 8,000 new COVID-19 cases for the third straight day on Sunday, August 1, as the country’s caseload neared 1.6 million.

The Department of Health (DOH) announced 8,735 new cases, bringing the total number of confirmed cases to 1,597,689.

This is the highest one-day tally in over two months or since May 28, when 8,748 cases were confirmed.

Sunday’s new cases followed the 8,562 infections reported on Friday, July 30, and the 8,147 infections logged on Saturday, July 31.

Some 127 new deaths were added to the tally. This raised the death toll due to the virus at 28,016.

Meanwhile, recoveries are up by 5,930, bringing total recoveries to 1,506,027.

Among all cases, 63,646 or 4% are active. This is the highest total number of active cases in nearly three months or since May 7, when there were 66,626 active cases.

The DOH said two testing laboratories were not operational on Friday, while four labs failed to submit data in time for Sunday’s bullletin.

Metro Manila is set to be placed again under enhanced community quarantine (ECQ), the strictest lockdown, from August 6 to 20, in a bid to fend off the threat of a surge due to the more infectious Delta variant of COVID-19. 

Before that, from July 31 to August 5, the region will be under general community quarantine with heightened and additional restrictions.

Iloilo City, Iloilo province, Cagayan de Oro City, and Gingoog City will also be under ECQ, from August 1 to 7, while Ilocos Norte, Bataan, Lapu-Lapu City, and Mandaue City will be under MECQ from August 1 to 15. 

On Sunday, Apayao, Laguna, and Aklan were added to the list of areas under MECQ for the same time period.

As of Thursday, July 29, the DOH reported that the Philippines has 216 known cases of the Delta variant. There are concerns that there may be more Delta variant cases, as the Philippine Genome Center is only sequencing a small percentage of positive cases. – Michael Bueza/Rappler.com