The Department of Health (DOH) on Tuesday, March 2, reported 2,067 more coronavirus disease (COVID-19) cases - bringing the nationwide tally to 580,442.

Of the cumulative total, 33,610 or 5.8 percent are active cases, the DOH said.

The Health department said that 89.8 percent of the active cases have mild symptoms, 4.8 percent are asymptomatic, 2.3 percent are in critical condition, 2.2 percent are severe cases, and 0.85 percent are in moderate condition.

The latest bulletin also showed that the death count climbed to 12,369 as 47 more patients died.  Meanwhile, the number of recoveries increased to 534,463 with 144 patients who have beaten the illness.

DOH Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said that they are currently studying the reason behind the spike in the number of new cases amid the detection of the more transmissible variants of coronavirus: the South African and the United Kingdom variants.

Vergeire said that there is a probability that these variants have contributed to the increasing number of new infections.

“The probability is always there because there are variants detected and the cases are rising. But we need to do a thorough analysis for us to be able to really confirm and say that the variants would be the cause of this increase in cases,” she said.

But there may be other factors, said the DOH spokesperson.

“We know that the variants can be another factor that hastens the increase in transmission. There are factors underlying to that,” she said.  

“Yung ating complacency...pag nakikita natin na hindi sumusunod yung ating mga kababayan sa minimum health protocols. Interzonal movements - yung mobility ng tao are causing also this increase in the number of cases (The complacency... when we see that some of our countrymen do not follow the minimum health protocols. Interzonal movements - human mobility are also causing this increase in the number of cases),” she added.