Metro Manila is currently experiencing a continued rise in the number of new Covid-19 cases, the Department of Health (DOH) reported on Tuesday, Sept. 20.
In the latest DOH report, some parts of the country have noted an increase in cases, while there is a declining trend in the Visayas.
“Increase in cases in NCR (National Capital Region) continues while Plus Areas show marginal case increase in recent days,” the DOH said.
“Rest of Luzon and Mindanao are now showing signs of plateauing. Visayas maintains a slow downward trend,” it added.
DOH Officer-in-Charge Maria Rosario Vergeire said that the rise in cases can be attributed to the increased mobility of the population, especially with the opening of in-person classes last August.
“Nakita natin na may medyo may kaunting pagtaas pagkatapos na mag-umpisa ng face-to-face (We have seen that there is a slight increase after face-to-face started) and that is expected because of mobility patterns,” said Vergeire in a press briefing.
“After the middle of August, third week of August, tumaas yung mobility patterns dito sa (the mobility patterns increased here in) Metro Manila and even in the other regions. This just implies na talagang lumalabas na ang mga tao (that people are now really going out more) because they feel—and we all feel—that we are protected because of vaccines and because other sectors are opening up like education,” she added.
The increase in cases cannot be linked yet to the new policy of making mask wearing optional outdoors, said Vergeire.
“We still cannot directly correlate this to the new masking rule. It has just been...how many days? seven days after the issuance of the Executive Order No. 3 and hanggang sa ngayon, hindi pa natin makikita yung direct link nito sa masking mandate dito sa pagtaas ng kaso sa iba’t-ibang bahagi ng bansa (until now, we have not seen its direct link to the masking mandate here in the increase of cases in the different parts of the country),” she said.
New variants
In a related development, the DOH also reported over 700 new cases of Omicron subvariant.
The DOH said there were 688 new BA.5 subvariant cases and 16 new BA.4 cases.
All regions detected have detected the BA.5 subvariant as well as 11 more returning overseas Filipinos, the DOH said.
Of the new BA.4 cases, one case each were found in Central Visayas and Bicol region, 12 cases in Soccsksargen, and two in Metro Manila.