MANILA – Additional 520 cases of the highly transmissible and dominant Delta variant of the coronavirus have been recorded nationwide, a health official said Tuesday.
In an online media forum, Department of Health Epidemiology Bureau OIC-Director Althea De Guzman said the new Delta variant cases were from a total of 748 samples that have been sequenced, noting that the agency is unsure if the samples were collected recently or in the previous months.
Of the samples collected and sequenced, about 520 or 69.52 percent were Delta variant cases, 83 or 11.10 percent were Beta variant cases, and 64 or 8.56 percent were Alpha variant cases.
The new logged variant cases pushed the total Delta variant cases to 5,331; Beta variant cases, 3,562; and Alpha variant cases, 3,106.
"The percent of Delta variant detected (in the country) has increased from 4.9 percent in June to 99.8 percent of lineages detected in October," De Guzman said.
She added eight of the 520 new cases of Delta variant are from the National Capital Region.
The top three regions with the most number of new Delta variant cases are Cordillera Administrative Region with 78 infections; Bicol Region, 75; and Cagayan Valley, 61.
De Guzman noted that all regions and all cities and municipalities in the National Capital Region (NCR) either have Alpha or Beta variants detected.
The Delta variant, initially detected from returning overseas Filipinos, is now detected in all 17 regions and all NCR cities and its lone municipality.
Meantime, the P.3 variant, which was initially observed in only one region in the country, is now detected in all regions. (PNA)
