Despite the continuous rise in Covid-19 cases, the country as well as all its regions remain under low-risk case classification, the Department of Health (DOH) said on Tuesday, July 12.
In a press briefing, Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire disclosed that the agency recorded 10,743 cases from July 5 to July 11. Average daily cases is at 1,535 the past week which is 41 percent higher than the previous week.
Vergeire stated that this is as high as the cases in the last week of February.
Meanwhile, Vergeire added that most areas show a sharp increase in Covid-19 cases with the National Capital Region (NCR) showing the steepest increase, currently exceeding 650 cases per day. Cases have been increasing in the NCR since mid-May.
She also said that the the rest of the plus areas, Luzon and Visayas, also continue to show a sharp increase in cases but remains below 350 per day while cases in Mindanao have plateaued since mid-June. There were recorded small upticks in the recent few days in Mindanao but cases remain to be less than 100 per day.
On the other hand, the average daily attack rate (ADAR) remains low except for NCR, Region IV-A, Region VI, and the Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR) which have an ADAR of 1.3 to 4.44 cases per 100,000 population. For the rest of the country, the ADAR remains at less than 1 case per 100,000 population.
"With this, the national positivity rate has increased to 9.5 percent similar to the rates in mid-February," Vergeire said.
"Bagamat patuloy sa pagtaas ang ating mga kaso nananatiling pa ring mas mababa sa 1,000 ang bilang ng severe at critical admissions at the national level since mid-March (Despite the increase in Covid-19 cases, severe and critical case admissions are still below 1,000 at the national level since mid-March)," she added.
DOH's case bulletin on Monday, July 11 showed that 555 patients with severe and critical Covid-19 infections are admitted, constituting 8.7 percent of total Covid-19 admissions.
Meanwhile, healthcare utilization remains at low risk in most areas, and severe and critical cases are at less than 1.5 percent among total hospital admissions nationally despite the increase in cases, according to Vergeire.
In DOH's case bulletin, the agency disclosed that 411 out of 2,414 Intensive Care Unit (ICU) beds or 17 percent are being used while 4,863 out of 21,424 non-ICU beds are being utilized or 22. 7 percent.