By Betheena Unite The Department of Health clarified on Monday that the actual coronavirus disease (COVID-19) tests done every day remain at 8,500 to 9,500 tests while the figure of 32,000 tests per day is the “estimated maximum capacity of all licensed laboratories in the country” at present. A nurse gets a swab from a health worker in a booth set up in a hospital parking lot as the Philippines ramps up testing for coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Manila, April 15, 2020. (REUTERS/Eloisa Lopez / MANILA BULLETIN) Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire clarified that the figure cited by Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque pertained to the estimated maximum capacity tests with available resources under “perfect conditions” or unhampered laboratory operations. “It’s the testing capacity based on existing resources, what we use is the estimated capacity and the actual capacity of laboratories,” Vergeire noted, explaining that the health department determines both the estimated capacity and actual capacity in reporting its data. This was clarified after Roque in a televised briefing announced that the country has already surpassed its goal to conduct 30,000 COVID-19 tests per day last May 20. “The 32,000 is the estimated maximum capacity of all licensed laboratories in the country. This is just an estimate, based on the number of machines, number of human resource and the operating hours per laboratory,” Vergeire said. “The 32,000 is the estimated capacity sans all other factors that may affect operations of laboratories.” Factors that may hinder laboratory operations could be equipment, personnel, and weather condition issues, the undersecretary said, stressing that the 32,000 capacity would only be achieved under unhampered operations. “Factors that may affect operations include availability of laboratory supplies in the market, health human resource issues, equipment issues and issues in infrastructure such as what happened to Bicol Lab during the typhoon; to UP NIH when the exhaust for their lab broke down; and to PRC when during the heavy rain, some of their equipment were affected due to drips in the ceiling of the building,” Vergeire explained. The country has a total of 42 licensed laboratories -- 34 RT-PCR licensed laboratories and eight licensed Gene Xpert facilities -- that can perform COVID-19 tests. The department also said that they have identified 17 laboratories that could be licensed in the next two weeks. Specific teams tasked to focus on laboratories, which are on the stage 3 and 4 of the licensing process, have been deployed to guide the facilities and expedite their licensing in the next couple of weeks. “Also in our existing labs, we have provided automated extraction machines which can lessen time for processing of samples by four hours per run. And also we have added additional RT PCR machines in some of the labs,” Vergeire said. Meanwhile, COVID-19 cases in the country grew to 14,319 as a total of 284 new cases were confirmed Monday with 74 new recoveries and five fatalities. Total number of recoveries is now at 3,323 while death toll is at 873.