THE Department of Health (DOH) on Saturday, June 12, 2021, reported 8,027 new infections, a new high in the last 15 days, as all laboratories were able to submit their data to the Covid-19 Document Repository System.
Based on the case bulletin on Saturday, there are now 1,308,352 coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) cases nationwide.
There were 145 additional mortalities, raising the death toll to 22,652 in the Philippines. The case fatality rate remained at 1.73 percent.
The DOH case bulletin also listed 8,940 recoveries, bringing the total recoveries to 1,225,359, or 93.7 percent of the total case count.
There remained 60,341 active cases, accounting for 4.6 percent of the total count.
As of June 10, 90.7 percent of the active cases were mild cases, 5.0 percent were asymptomatic, 1.7 percent were severe, 1.3 percent were critical and 1.2 percent were moderate.
In Central Visayas, the number of active Covid-19 cases once again surpassed the 5,000 mark on Friday, June 11, with the majority of the cases recorded in Negros Oriental.
Based on the daily update of cases uploaded by the DOH 7 in its official Facebook page, the last time that the region’s active cases reached 5,000 was on Feb. 11, 2021 at 5,040.
The DOH 7, on Friday, logged 652 new confirmed cases, 123 additional reported recoveries and three additional deaths. This brought the total number of active Covid-19 cases in the region at 5,529.
Of the 5,529 active cases, majority or 2,871 are logged in Negros Oriental, followed by 1,261 active cases in Bohol.
Cebu City has a total of 552 active cases, followed by Cebu Province with 481, Mandaue City with 170, Lapu-Lapu City with 169 and Siquijor with 25.
Dr. Mary Jean Loreche, DOH 7 spokesperson, said Cebu’s latest critical care utilization rate (CCUR) is 18.4 percent with only 159 of the 862 beds allocated for Covid patients currently occupied.
A CCUR within 60 percent, the DOH said, is considered safe.
The CCUR refers to the number of intensive care units (ICUs), isolation beds and ventilators in use in different health and medical facilities for Covid-19 patients.
However, as of June 11, Negros Oriental’s CCUR for Covid ICU beds in hospitals was 80 percent.
Loreche, earlier, said it was difficult to raise the number of ICU beds in Negros Oriental as it only has one level 3 and three level 2 hospitals.
She said the foreseen solution would be to set up and activate an Emergency Operations Center (EOC) that will conduct aggressive contact tracing, testing, extraction and treatment and isolation in addition to strict enforcement of minimum public health standards.
She said Negros Oriental was already guided on how to set up its own EOC.
“They, most likely, are also putting in place their processes so they can cope with their rising cases,” she said. (WBS / HDT / SunStar Philippines)