The Department of Health (DOH) said all regions in the country, except Caraga, already have the Delta variant of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19).
"As of now based on our specimen sampled, all regions except Caraga," DOH Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said in an online press briefing Monday, August 16.
"But it doesn't mean that they don't have the variant. As what we've said, the sampling we use doesn't cover really that much of the population for us to determine where it is in the regions. So now we still assume there is," she added.
The DOH on Sunday, Aug. 15, reported the detection of additional 182 cases with the Delta variant, 66 cases with the Beta variant, 41 cases with the Alpha variant, 40 cases with the P.3 variant, and the first case of the Lambda variant from the latest batch of samples sequenced by the University of the Philippines - Philippine Genome Center (UP-PGC).
Of the additional 182 Delta variant cases, the Health department said112 are local cases, 36 are Returning Overseas Filipinos (ROF), and 34 cases are still being verified if local or ROF cases.
Vergeire also clarified that the three cases reported in Caraga on Sunday were ROFs.
"Their addresses were Caraga but they are ROFs. We won't classify them as local case in Caraga as it is an ROF," she said.
Vergeire added that the said individuals have yet to return to Caraga and are isolated in a national facility.
She also provided other information on the first Lambda variant case from Region 6.
"This is a 35-year-old female. She has no symptoms. She is classified as recovered but of course we are still validating and we are going to do repeat RT-PCR," said Vergeire.
Based on record, she said, the individual is also pregnant.
"Our probable classification of her it's a local case...we are also trying to get the status of her vaccination," said Vergeire.
The Lambda variant is currently classified as a variant of interest (VOI).