NEW Covid-19 cases continued to climb toward the April 2021 peak, exceeding 12,000 for the second consecutive day on Thursday, August 12, 2021, and pushing the total count past 1.7 million.
In its case bulletin, the Department of Health (DOH) reported 12,439 new cases, 165 additional deaths and 6,090 recoveries.
The daily positivity rate increased further to 22.5 percent, highest since the 22.7 percent on April 4, 2021, although testing output improved to 57,016 on August 10.
Only two laboratories failed to submit their testing data to the Covid-19 Document Repository System.
The new infections brought the cumulative case count to 1,700,363. There were 116 duplicates, including 108 recoveries, that were removed from the tally.
Of the total, there were 87,663 active cases, a new high in over three months since the 89,485 on April 24. These included three cases tagged as recoveries but reclassified to active cases.
Deaths
The additional deaths, which included 85 cases that were previously tagged as recoveries, raised the death toll to 29,539. The case fatality rate remained at 1.74 percent.
With the additional recoveries, the total is now 1,583,161.
Among the active cases, 0.9 percent were critical, 1.5 percent were severe, 1.08 percent were moderate, 95.3 percent were mild and 1.2 percent were asymptomatic.
Covid-19 cases have been climbing toward a new epidemic peak since the second half of July 2021, coinciding with the detection of local cases with the highly contagious Delta variant (B.1.617.2).
Cases first peaked at 6,958 on Aug. 10, 2020. A new outbreak on April 21 saw the highest seven-day average at 10,800 a day and the highest daily count at 15,310 on April 2, although this number included a backlog of 3,709 cases from March 31.
The highest count in a single day in April 2021 was 12,674 on April 10.
The Delta variant has been detected in 13 regions. All 17 regions have either Alpha or Beta variant cases. The P.3 variant, which first emerged in Central Visayas, has spread to 14 regions.
Cebu City
In Cebu City, the Emergency Operations Center (EOC) reported that as of Aug. 12, 2021, a total of 1,051 people had died of Covid-19 in the city since March 2020.
The fatality rate has reached 3.19 percent.
On the first 11 days of August, 85 lives were lost to Covid-19 in Cebu City, just three deaths short of recorded fatalities for the entire month of July 2021.
Based on the EOC’s tally, a total of 32,913 individuals had been infected with the Covid-29 virus.
Of the number, 28,296 had fully recovered while 3,566 are still active cases.
Councilor Joel Garganera, EOC deputy chief implementer, said public and private hospitals in Cebu City are now swamped with Covid cases.
The critical utilization rate has reached 72.7 percent, he said.
Of the 964 Covid beds, 701 are currently occupied while 263 are vacant due to the lack of medical personnel who can attend to the Covid patients.
On Thursday, Aug. 12, Cebu City registered 277 new Covid-19 cases with five deaths.
Of the 80 barangays in Cebu City, Guadalupe, registered the most number of active cases at 205, followed by Talamban (173), Tisa (152), Lahug (120), and Camputhaw (114).
Councilor Dave Tumulak, head of the City Council Committee on Disaster Risk Reduction and Management, said City Hall is preparing 1,160 niches in cemeteries located in barangays Calamba, Talamban, Luz and Carreta to help the poor needing burial assistance for relatives who had died of Covid.
But the City still has to get the approval of the Archdiocese of Cebu on this, Tumulak said. (PAC)