2,987 new COVID-19 cases push Philippines' total to 139,538
MANILA, Philippines (Updated 4:50 p.m.) — The country’s coronavirus case tally went up to 139,538 Tuesday after the Department of Health reported nearly 3,000 additional infections.
The Department of Health logged 2,987 new cases—the first time in nearly two weeks that the country did not report at least 3,000 additional cases. The day before, record-high 6,985 infections were recorded.
Metro Manila was the source of around 51% or 1,510 of the newly-announced cases. It was followed by Cavite with 398 cases, Laguna with 144, Iloilo with 135 and Cebu with 119.
The number of active cases stood at 68,794—91.6% of which were mild cases.
The Philippines has the most number of coronavirus infections in Southeast Asia and has more cases that mainland China, where the pathogen first emerged late last year.
The DOH also registered 280 additional recoveries, raising the total number of COVID-19 survivors to 68,432. Recoveries accounted for nearly half of the nation’s confirmed cases.
But the death toll also rose to 2,312 after 19 more patients died from the respiratory illness.
The department said Tuesday’s numbers were based on data submitted by 74 out of the 99 operational laboratories in the country. It also removed 87 duplicates from the total case count.
To date, some 1.7 million individuals have been tested for coronavirus.
Outbreak epicenter Metro Manila and the neighboring areas of Bulacan, Cavite, Rizal and Bulacan will remain under modified enhanced community quarantine until August 18.
Presidential spokesperson Harry Roque said an extension of MECQ is “highly unlikely.”
The coronavirus pandemic has killed more than 734,000 people worldwide with nearly 20 million infected.
Follow this page for updates on a mysterious pneumonia outbreak that has struck dozens of people in China.
New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins says on Sunday that he had contracted COVID-19, testing positive at a key point in his flailing campaign for re-election.
Hipkins saYS on his official social media feed that he would need to isolate for up to five days -- less than two weeks before his country's general election.
The leader of the centre-left Labour Party said he started to experience cold symptoms on Saturday and had cancelled most of his weekend engagements. — AFP
The World Health Organization and US health authorities say Friday they are closely monitoring a new variant of COVID-19, although the potential impact of BA.2.86 is currently unknown.
The WHO classified the new variant as one under surveillance "due to the large number (more than 30) of spike gene mutations it carries", it wrote in a bulletin about the pandemic late Thursday.
So far, the variant has only been detected in Israel, Denmark and the United States. — AFP
The World Health Organization says on Friday that the number of new COVID-19 cases reported worldwide rose by 80% in the last month, days after designating a new "variant of interest".
The WHO declared in May that Covid is no longer a global health emergency, but has warned that the virus will continue to circulate and mutate, causing occasional spikes in infections, hospitalisations and deaths.
In its weekly update, the UN agency said that nations reported nearly 1.5 million new cases from July 10 to August 6, an 80% increase compared to the previous 28 days. — AFP
The head of US intelligence says that there was no evidence that the COVID-19 virus was created in the Chinese government's Wuhan research lab.
In a declassified report, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) says they had no information backing recent claims that three scientists at the lab were some of the very first infected with COVID-19 and may have created the virus themselves.
Drawing on intelligence collected by various member agencies of the US intelligence community (IC), the ODNI report says some scientists at the Wuhan lab had done genetic engineering of coronaviruses similar to COVID-19. — AFP
Boris Johnson deliberately misled MPs over Covid lockdown-breaking parties in Downing Street when he was prime minister, a UK parliament committee ruled on Thursday.
The cross-party Privileges Committee said Johnson, 58, would have been suspended as an MP for 90 days for "repeated contempts (of parliament) and for seeking to undermine the parliamentary process".
But he avoided any formal sanction by his peers in the House of Commons by resigning as an MP last week.
In his resignation statement last Friday, Johnson pre-empted publication of the committee's conclusions, claiming a political stitch-up, even though the body has a majority from his own party.
He was unrepentant again on Thursday, accusing the committee of being "anti-democratic... to bring about what is intended to be the final knife-thrust in a protracted political assassination".
Calling it "beneath contempt", he said it was "for the people of this to decide who sits in parliament, not Harriet Harman", the veteran opposition Labour MP who chaired the seven-person committee. — AFP
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