The Philippines detected 411 new Delta variant cases of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) from samples collected in the past months.
Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire on Monday, Oct. 11, said 747 samples collected in February, April, May, August, and September were sequenced on Oct. 8.
Of these, 411 or 55 percent of the total samples are Delta variant cases, 88 or 11.8 percent are Alpha variant cases, and 78 or 10.4 percent are Beta variant cases.
“We are doing retrospective sampling to trace the beginnings of the Delta variant introduction to the country, as well as the early less cases,” Vergeire said in a virtual briefing.
“Our sequencing run also has a paucity of samples in the months of April and May since we did not have yet sequencing kits then, and we want to fill in this gap in sequencing for these critical months,” she added.
Out of the 16,399 samples sequenced as of Oct. 8, Vergeire said that 14,517 samples or 88.52 percent have lineages.
Of the number, 69.2 percent of the samples with lineages are positive for the Alpha, Beta, and Delta variants, she added.