Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, January 6) — Coronavirus cases in the country rose to 480,737 on Wednesday, after the Department of Health detected 1,047 new infections.
Active cases, or currently ill patients, account for or 22,690 or 4.7% of the total tally, the DOH said.
The highest rise in cases were recorded in Davao City with 79, Quezon City with 58, Laguna with 55, Bulacan with 40, and the City of Cagayan de Oro with 40.
The department also said 339 more patients have gotten well, raising the recoveries to 448,700. Meanwhile, 26 more died, with the death toll reaching 9,347. The DOH noted that it reclassified as deaths 13 cases mistakenly reported as recoveries.
It added that three testing laboratories failed to submit data on time and were not yet included in the latest figures. Three duplicates were also removed from the overall count.
On Tuesday, Hong Kong authorities reported that they detected the new UK COVID-19 variant (B.1.1.7) in a passenger who arrived from Manila on December 22. The DOH and the Philippine Genome Center said, however, that the new variant — believed to be more contagious — has not yet reached the Philippines based on the review of recent samples.
The global tally has surpassed 86.5 million, including over 1.8 million fatalities and 48.5 million recoveries, based on the Johns Hopkins University tracker.
In another report, the Department of Foreign Affairs said cases among Filipinos abroad hit 13,001 with five more confirmed infections. Recoveries rose to 8,446 with an additional 16, while deaths are still at 934.
