British Ambassador to the Philippines Laure Beaufils has contracted the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), making her among those infected during the holiday season.
In a Twitter post on New Year’s Eve, Beaufils said she has been in isolation with her family at home in Manila.
“My family and I are isolating and recovering from COVID at home in #Manila. We are lucky: we will be fine,” she wrote.
The female envoy accompanied her tweet with a post of Professor and data analyst Edson Guido on Thursday, Dec. 30, about the Philippines’ positivity rate that was “back to over 10%.”
Guido tweeted about the jump in the country’s positivity rate—from 4.5 percent on Dec. 27 to 10.4 percent last Dec. 29.
READ: COVID-19 cases continue to rise as DOH records close to 3K new infections
With this, Beaufils called on the public to continue observing the strict health protocols and get vaccinated.
“But please don't let your guards down: #SocialDistance #WearAMask #GetVaccinated,” she added.
The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends a positivity rate of less than five percent, which the country was able to achieve in the past two months since it experienced a drop in the new number of daily COVID-19 cases.
Two weeks ago on Dec. 20, the Philippines had a positivity rate of just 0.9 percent.
The Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases announced on New Year’s Eve that the National Capital Region (NCR) will revert to the stricter Alert Level 3.
READ: Metro Manila placed on Alert Level 3 from Jan 3-15; stricter measures for unvaccinated ordered
The Department of Health (DOH) has confirmed at least three local cases of the highly infectious Omicron variant as it reported 2,961 new COVID-19 cases detected on Dec. 31.