Health Secretary Francisco Duque III
MANILA – The Philippines is one of the Asean countries that have logged the lowest number of daily new confirmed Covid-19 cases, Health Secretary Francisco Duque III said Tuesday night.
In his presentation to President Rodrigo Duterte, Duque noted that the Philippines only logs 3.45 new infections for every 1 million individuals per day as of March 28.
The Philippines is followed by Cambodia with 3.61 cases; Myanmar with 4.52; and Indonesia, with 17.82.
Citing Our World in Data figures, the countries with the most number of cases include Brunei with 1,968.79 infections; Vietnam, 1,724.56; Singapore, 1,295.34; Malaysia, 615.65; Thailand, 360.67; and Laos, 293.52.
"Tingnan niyo naman naglipana ang kaso sa mga nasa itaas ng listahan. So, dapat ito ay ipagpatuloy lang natin, basta’t maganda po at consistent ang ating pong pagsasakatuparan ng ating mga interventions sa pandemic response na ito (Look at how high the cases are at the top of the list. So, we must continue, good and consistent implementation of our pandemic response interventions)," Duque said.
In Asia, China has logged the lowest number of cases at only 1.3 per 1 million population.
Covid-19 cases continue to rise in countries in the region due to the spread of the more transmissible Omicron subvariant, BA.2.
The Philippines' cases peaked in January when the Omicron variant entered in December 2021.
For the week of March 23 to 29, the country logged 2,651 new cases, lower than the 3,319 infections from the previous week.
The average daily cases per day is 378.
Only one case was added to the severe and critical cases tally.
The nation's cumulative case fatality rate remained low at 1.61 percent while the recovery rate is at 97.3 percent.
Laboratories nationwide are able to test 21,875 per day and the positivity rate went down to 2 percent this week from last week's 2.5 percent based on the seven-day moving average.
For the healthcare utilization rate, only 17.5 percent of the non-intensive care unit (ICU) beds are utilized while 14.5 percent ICU beds are used.
Severe and critical admissions are at 11.6 percent or 752 of the 6,509 total hospital admissions. (PNA)
