LESS than 5,000 new coronavirus infections were reported for the second consecutive day on Wednesday, May 12, 2021, as testing output also remained low.
In its case bulletin, the Department of Health (DOH) confirmed 4,842 new cases of coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19), bringing the cumulative case count to 1,118,359.
The daily positivity rate remained below 13 percent. Of the 33,529 samples tested on May 10, 12.5 percent were found positive for Sars-CoV-2.
The DOH also reported 94 additional mortalities, raising the death toll to 18,714. The case fatality rate remained at 1.67 percent.
There were 8,312 additional recoveries, pushing the total to 1,046,431, or 93.6 percent of the total cases.
With recoveries exceeding new infections, the number of active cases further declined to 53,214, or 4.8 percent of the cumulative case count.
Meanwhile, the total number of Covid-19 cases with Sars-CoV-2 variants of concern (VOC) has increased to 2,054 as of May 9, the latest biosurveillance report of the University of the Philippines - Philippine Genome Center showed.
There were also 157 cases with the P.3 variant, a variant of interest first reported in the Philippines. One patient with P.3 died while another is still an active case.
The VOCs are B.1.1.7 (United Kingdom), B.1.351 (South Africa), P.1 (Brazil) and B.1.617 (India). Preliminary data show that these are more transmissible. Studies are still ongoing on the impact of these VOCs on severity of the disease and vaccine efficacy.
Of the 2,054 cases with VOCs, only 13 are active cases while 39 had died and the rest have recovered.
The cases include 952 B.1.1.7 cases, 1,098 B.1.351 cases, two P.1 cases and two B.1.617.2 cases.
A total of 7,213 coronavirus-positive samples have been sequenced as of May 9. (Marites Villamor-Ilano / SunStar Philippines)