Rizal evicts Metro Manila as the area with the most COVID-19 cases

MANILA, Philippines – Metro Manila was replaced by Rizal Province as the area with the highest number of COVID-19 cases after the Department of Health (DOH) revised its report on Saturday, breaking down the areas that recorded new infections by province or city.

Rizal accounted for 185 of the 2,673 new cases, followed by the provinces of Cavite with 175 and Batangas with 159.

Quezon City was the only Metro Manila city to rank in the top five with 143 cases, followed by Bulacan with 88. The number of cases nationwide now stands at 354,338.

The DOH did not immediately explain why it revised the reporting system again, but it came as the government began easing quarantine restrictions, ahead of the Christmas rush that is expected to prop up the economy that plunged into recession due to the pandemic. .

The new data raised the count of active cases to 52,423, of which 84.7 percent are mild, 11 percent asymptomatic, 1.5 percent severe and 2.9 percent critical.

There are now a total of 295,312 survivors of COVID-19 with the recovery of 539 more patients. The death toll, however, rose to 6,603 when 73 patients succumbed to the severe respiratory illness.

Of the recently reported deaths, 49 died this month, three in September, 18 in August, two in July and one in May.

Thirty-two of the fatalities were from Metro Manila, 10 from Calabarzon, nine from central Luzon, five from Zamboanga, five from Caraga, four from Davao, three from Western Visayas, two from Soccsksargen, and one from Ilocos, Bicol and Central. Visayas.

But although the country showed signs of slowing down, cases in the United States continued to rise while most of Europe has resumed strict quarantine measures.

This prompted the World Health Organization (WHO) to call on an already eager public to “wait a little longer” and continue to observe preventive health measures.

Epidemiologist Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove said WHO understands the “great sense of anxiety” and frustration around the world as the outbreak has lasted for 10 months.

But the public, he said, must remember that “there are things they must do to continue to be able to protect themselves” and their communities at this point in the pandemic.

“The decisions that we all make, those little decisions that we make, are having an impact. If we can wait a little longer, we will get through this, ”said Kerkhove, technical leader of the WHO health emergencies program.

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