Philippines’ second COVID-19 wave is also its first major wave, says expert

The Philippines’ second wave of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) cases is also its first major wave with over 10,000 infections, a public health expert said Wednesday.

Epidemiologist Dr. John Wong, a member of the government’s inter-agency COVID-19 task force, said the three Chinese nationals who contracted the respiratory disease in January are part of the country’s first wave of infections.

One of the three patients succumbed to COVID-19, becoming the first fatality outside the outbreak’s epicenter of mainland China, while the other two eventually recovered and returned to their home.

The announcement of the three initial cases was followed by a month-long lull due to limited testing, until the Philippines began to see an uptick in cases in March as testing capacity slowly expanded.

Wong defined an outbreak wave as “the rise and fall” of cases.

“The January set of cases was a small wave. It's a very small wave, pero since there was a rise in cases and then a fall, we still count that as a wave,” he explained in a virtual press briefing of the Department of Health (DOH).

“Whereas the second wave, you can also call it the first major wave that we have because it had a lot more cases than the first one, more than 10,000 cases,” he added.

Health Secretary Francisco Duque III earlier bared that the country is already experiencing the second wave.

Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire added that the second wave peaked last March 31, when the DOH announced 538 new cases in one day.

Flattening the curve

Wong previously reported that the Philippines’ curve of COVID-19 cases was flattening at a “dramatic” rate, especially in Metro Manila.

He noted that the average rate of new cases of the country was 220 per day. The highest number of new cases per day was reported in March, in which there were over 500 reported.

“We’ve flattened it in relation to our health system capacity… If we keep below that capacity then we can say we have flattened the curve. If we do not do any interventions, [cases] would have exceeded the health system capacity,” he explained.

“A curve that is flattened means, instead of going straight up, it plateaus, it levels out.”

Wong also underscored the need to prevent subsequent waves of infection once quarantine restrictions are eased across the country.

Data questioned

Senator Risa Hontiveros on Wednesday questioned claims that the country has flattened the curve, citing a lack of consistent and reliable data on COVID-19 cases.

"So papaano po natin make-claim na na-flatten na natin 'yung curve kung ni hindi pa natin na drawing 'yung unang curve, 'yung baseline natin, 'yung situation natin with enough testing?" she said in a Senate hearing.

The DOH earlier admitted that the data released every day is not yet real-time but unveiled plans to digitize the surveillance of COVID-19 patients.

Vince Dizon, the deputy chief implementer of the government’s COVID-19 action plan, said last week that there are still some 7,000 testing backlogs that need to be processed.

Data from the Health department show that 207,823 people have been tested as of May 15 and 82.4 percent of them tested negative while 8.1 percent turned out positive.

Malacañang said its goal is to test 1.5 percent to 2 percent of the Philippine population. 

On the current status of COVID-19 cases, the country has logged 13,221 cases with 2,932 cases and 842 recoveries as of Wednesday afternoon. -- BAP, GMA News