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LAST MINUTE SHOPPING People flock to the Commonwealth Market in Quezon City on Thursday to shop last minute for the traditional Christmas Eve meal. They forget about physical distancing, despite a request from the local government for them to observe public health measures to prevent an increase in coronavirus infections after the holidays. —GRIG C. MONTEGRANDE
Manila, Philippines – COVID-19 testing labs have been told to stand by for a surge in demand for testing after the holidays due to an expected spike in new coronavirus infections. Health and trade officials led by Health Secretary Francisco Duque III visited licensed testing labs in the city of Makati on Wednesday.
One of the labs they visited, Health Metrics, caters primarily to inbound and outbound merchant seafarers and currently conducts an average of 70 COVID-19 tests per day.
Health Metrics president Antonio Abaya said the lab could run up to 500 tests per shift and could increase the number of shifts if necessary.
Duque thanked the labs for operating during the holidays.
“I urge all labs to help the government meet the growing demand for testing that comes with the observed increase in cases,” he said.
6.2 million tests
Currently, there are 192 licensed COVID-19 testing labs across the country. They have performed more than 6.2 million tests so far, according to the Department of Health (DOH).
Of the authorized laboratories, 147 are real-time RT-PCR laboratories, while 45 are GeneXpert laboratories.
Both types of laboratory tests process the reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR), which DOH considers the gold standard for confirming coronavirus infection. They only differ in how the samples are processed.
The DOH said that about 100 more labs were applying for accreditation, of which 55 were nearing the final stages of accreditation.
As of December 12, 6,236,830 COVID-19 tests had been performed for 5,874,023 people, and 8.7 percent of the tests were positive for the new coronavirus.
On Thursday, DOH recorded an additional 1,776 coronavirus infections, bringing the total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases to 465,724.
Quezon City reported the highest number of new infections (128), followed by Davao City (121), Rizal Province (94), Samar Province (57), and Bulacan (56).
The DOH said 533 more patients had recovered, bringing the total number of COVID-19 survivors to 430,490. But the death toll rose to 9,055 with the death of seven more patients.
Deaths and recoveries left the country with 26,179 active cases, of which 81.4 percent were mild, 10.3 percent asymptomatic, 0.34 moderate, 2.7 percent severe, and 5.2 percent critical.
Fight against increased quality control
Meanwhile, the Quezon City government on Thursday urged residents to observe public health measures during the Christmas and New Year celebrations to prevent a spike in new COVID-19 cases after the holidays.
Citing data from the DOH, the city government said that an average of 120 cases were recorded between December 16 and 21. The number had risen from the week before, when about 90 cases were recorded every day from December 9-15.
The single-case virus reproduction rate (R0, pronounced R null) also increased in December. It was registered at 1.54 a.m. on Sunday, Rolly Cruz, the city’s chief epidemiologist, said Thursday.
In November, the average R0 in the city was 0.74.
Previously, experts said that an R0 number above 1 indicated an upward trend in infections. The World Health Organization considers 0.5 as the ideal R0.
As cases mounted, Quezon City stepped up testing in recent days. He did more than 2,190 a day from December 14-20.
The local government also stepped up contact tracing, according to the head of the city’s COVID-19 task force, Joseph Juico. –WITH A REPORT FROM NIKKA G. VALENZUELA INQ
For more news on the new coronavirus, click here.
What you need to know about the coronavirus.
For more information on COVID-19, call the DOH hotline: (02) 86517800 local 1149/1150.
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