Philippines logs 1,206 new COVID-19 cases from Jan. 23-29, down by 36%

A total of 1,206 new COVID-19 cases were recorded in the country from January 23 to January 29, Department of Health’s (DOH) data showed on Monday.

The infections logged in the past week were lower than the 1,891 cases from January 16 to January 22, based on the agency’s latest bulletin.

The daily case average for the recent week also went down to 172 from the previous 270. This was a 36% lower tally than last week.

This week marked the 13th week with less than 10,000 weekly new cases.

However, 74 additional verified COVID-19-related deaths were belatedly recorded by the DOH from September 2020 to January 2023.

Of these deaths, eight occurred in January 2023, 19 in December 2022, six in November 2022, one in March 2022, five in February 2022, four in January 2022, one in November 2021, four in October 2021, nine in September 2021, three in August 2021, three in July 2021, five in June 2021, one in May 2021, one in April 2021, one in February 2021, one in January 2021, one in December 2020, and one in September 2020.

Six of these fatalities occurred from January 16 to January 29, alone.

Vaccination, hospital updates

Further, at least 73.8 million Filipinos, or 94.54% of the government’s target population are now fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to DOH.

Of this number, 14,419 completed their primary series from January 23 to January 29.

The number of boosted individuals also increased to 21.3 million, of whom 50,474 were boosted in the same period.

Meanwhile, at least 6.9 million senior citizens, or 79.47% of the target A2 population have also received their primary vaccine series.

Data also showed that there were 456 severe and critical cases admitted in hospitals due to COVID-19 as of January 29. This was 9.5% of the total COVID-19 admissions.

Of the new cases recorded in the recent week, there was only one patient tagged as a new severe or critical case. DOH said this was only 0.08% of the new cases reported for the week.

At least 330 or 14.0% of the 2,359 intensive care unit (ICU) beds were also used, while 3,606 or 19.5% of the 18,467 non-ICU COVID-19 beds were occupied.

Last week, DOH officer-in-charge Maria Rosario Vergeire said that hospital admissions in the country have become manageable with COVID-19 no longer among the Philippines’ Top 10 causes of deaths.—LDF, GMA Integrated News