Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 9) – The Department of Health on Wednesday announced 3,651 new COVID-19 infections, while the country’s active case tally dipped to below 100,000.
The bulletin showed the number of Filipinos currently sick with the virus is now at 96,326, the first time in a little over a month – or since Jan. 7 – that it fell to a five-digit figure.
It makes up 2.7% of total cases, which have climbed to 3,623,176.
According to DOH, 12,834 more people were cleared of the infection, bringing total recoveries to 3,472,160.
There were also 69 more deaths, 25 of which occurred this month. Thirty-six were from January, while the other eight were late reports from March to October 2021. These raised the death toll to 54,690.
Of the newly confirmed cases, the DOH said 95% were detected within the last 14 days.
Western Visayas was the top contributing region with 523 infections, overtaking Metro Manila which came second with 484. Calabarzon logged the third highest increase at 414.
The nationwide positivity rate, meanwhile, was at 16.5%, based on 29,970 coronavirus tests reported to the government on Feb. 7. This refers to the percentage of infected people out of all tested.
Three testing laboratories failed to send their reports on time, the department said. It noted these three contributed an average of 0.8% of samples tested and 0.9% of positive results in the last two weeks.
After final validation, the DOH removed from its case count 105 duplicate entries and three cases found to have tested negative.
It added that 49 cases it mistakenly declared as recoveries were reclassified as deaths.
