OCTA: NCR to see 2,000 COVID-19 cases per day in October

The independent monitoring group OCTA Research said at least 2,000 COVID-19 cases will be seen daily in the National Capital Region (NCR) at the start of October as the region’s weekly positivity rate increased.

OCTA research fellow Dr. Guido David said that the weekly positivity rate in the NCR rose to 17.5% as of September 21 from 14.3% on September 14.

David said the region’s positivity rate “matched” the previous peak on August 5.

“It is now likely that this current resurgence will see higher positivity rates over the next weeks,” he said in a tweet on Thursday.

The positivity rate refers to the percentage of people found positive for COVID-19 among the total number of individuals tested.

He said the seven-day average of new cases in the NCR also went up to 1,128 - an increase of 28% from the previous week.

David said this was equivalent to an average daily attack rate (ADAR) of 7.83 per 100,000 population. He said this was considered “moderate” risk.

ADAR is the incidence showing the average number of new cases in a period per 100,000 people.

The COVID-19 reproduction number in NCR also climbed to 1.26 on September 19 from 1.19 on September 12.

“It looks like the NCR will exceed 2,000 cases per day by the start of October,” David said.

The reproduction number refers to the number of people infected by one case. A reproduction number that is below 1 indicates that the transmission of the virus is slowing down.

Meanwhile, the OCTA Research fellow said the COVID healthcare utilization in the region remained “low” at 38%, while the intensive care unit (ICU) utilization rate ws at 30%. — DVM, GMA News