PH logs over 12,000 new COVID-19 infections; active cases at new all-time high
The country recorded 12,576 new COVID-19 cases, pushing the total to 784,043, according to the Department of Health’s Saturday case bulletin.
It is the third time this week that the country had more than 10,000 cases reported in a day. The total does not yet include data from seven laboratories that have yet to submit their reports, the DOH noted.
Active cases are also at a new all-time high of 165,715, making it the 5th consecutive day the country broke its record of highest number of currently ill patients in a day. The active case count is equivalent to 21.1% of the COVID-19 total. At least 96.5% of the active cases have mild symptoms, 2.2% have no symptoms, 0.5% are in critical condition, 0.5% are severe cases, and 0.3% are in moderate condition.
The positivity rate is also at an all-time high at 24.2%, but this is only based on data as of noon of April 2. The DOH will still update the figure later. Positivity rate is the percentage of individuals who tested positive out of all patients tested in a day. Experts said a bigger percentage suggests higher viral transmission within the community and the need to increase testing capacity.
The death toll also climbed to 13,423 – which is 1.71% of the case count – after 103 more patients died. Meanwhile, 599 others got better, raising the recovery count to 604,905 or 77.2% of the COVID-19 tally.
The DOH said it reclassified 48 survivors into fatalities after validation and removed 30 duplicates, including 14 recoveries.
“The relatively high number of deaths in today’s bulletin stems from the ongoing data reconciliation process with both the Philippine Statistics Authority and our local Epidemiology Surveillance Units,” the department explained.
The agency also updated the April 1 positivity rate at 21.8% after 8,450 individuals tested positive out of 38,733 people tested. This is the 4th day in a row that the rate was above 20% which is high, considering the World Health Organization recommends that the number be kept below 5%.
