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MANILA, Philippines – The total number of COVID-19 cases in the country breached 3.2 million on Sunday, January 16, as reported new cases topped 30,000 for the fifth consecutive day.
In its latest bulletin, the Department of Health (DOH) announced 37,154 new cases, bringing the Philippines’ total caseload to 3,205,396.
It is the third highest tally of new cases so far, after the current record of 39,004 on Saturday, January 15, and 37,207 new cases on Friday, January 14.
The total number of active cases stood at 287,856 or 9% of all confirmed cases on Sunday.
The DOH also reported a positivity rate of 47.4% out of 81,381 tests which were done on Friday. This means that nearly one in two people tested for COVID-19 turned out positive.
These positive cases are added to the tally of confirmed cases only after further validation. This is to make sure that there would be no duplicate cases, and that all test results had been submitted, explained the department.
The DOH said all testing hubs were operational on Friday, but 12 laboratories were not able to submit their data on time. The cases reflected in the bulletin were based on tests conducted two days ago.
A total of 50 new deaths were also reported on Sunday, but only 30 of these fatalities occurred in January 2022. The rest happened in 2021. The late reporting is due to “late encoding of death information” into the COVIDKaya system, noted the health department.
Meanwhile, recoveries were up by 30,037, raising the total to 2,864,633.
It is the highest one-day tally of reported recoveries in over three months, or since October 3, 2021, when 45,249 new recoveries were announced.
To help reduce the spread of the virus, which sped up following confirmed cases of the Omicron variant in the country, the government retained Metro Manila and other areas under Alert Level 3 from January 16 to January 31. The quarantine level was also expanded to more areas.
The Department of Education (DepEd) suspended classes in Metro Manila beginning January 15 until January 22.
DepEd-Calabarzon followed suit with its suspension of classes in the region from January 17 to January 29. – Rappler.com
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