New record-high 26,458 COVID-19 cases bring active tally to 100K

The Philippines on Saturday recorded 26,458 new COVID-19 cases, the highest daily tally since the start of pandemic, bringing the nationwide COVID-19 tally to 2,936,875.

The previous highest daily case count reported was 26,303 last September 11, 2021.

Based on the Health department's latest bulletin, the new figures brought the country's active case count to 102,017, of which 3,399 are asymptomatic, 94,007 are mild cases; 2,842 are moderate cases while at least 1,462 are severe, and 307 are in critical condition.

The DOH said of the 26,458 reported cases today, 26,277 or 99% occurred within the recent 14 days from December 26 to January 8, 2022.

Cases per region

The top regions with cases in the recent two weeks were the National Capital Region with 16,139 or 61%, followed by Region 4-A with 5,387 or 21% and Region 3 with 2,281 or 9%.

The number of recoveries climbed to 2,782,723 after 1,656 more patients recovered from the respiratory disease.

The country’s death toll rose to 52,135, with 265 new fatalities.

Positivity rate

Meanwhile, the Philippines’ COVID-19 positivity rate was at 43.7%, higher than the 40% positivity rate on Friday.

Both are higher than the World Health Organization's requirement target of less than 5% positivity rate, which means that there is a high transmission rate of the virus.

A total of 77,004 COVID-19 tests were administered.

The latest data also showed that 34% of 3,500 intensive care unit (ICU) beds for COVID-19 patients nationwide are in use.

At least 34% of the 13,000 ward beds in the country were utilized, while 62% of the 4,400 ward beds in the NCR were in use.

The Health department said all laboratories were operational since January 6, while there were six laboratories that failed to submit data to the COVID-19 Document Repository System.

The agency reported that 131 duplicates were removed from the total case count. Of these, 101 are recoveries and one death.

Meanwhile, at least 238 cases that were previously tagged as recoveries were reclassified as deaths after final validation. -- BAP, GMA News