AN OFFICIAL from the Davao City Health Office (CHO) revealed that their office is currently validating the city's Covid-19 case data after discovering that half of the current active cases have already recovered.
CHO Acting Head Dr. Ashley Lopez said in a radio interview on Wednesday, June 30, that their office, in coordination of the Regional Epidemiological Surveillance Unit (Resu) of the Department of Health (DOH)-Davao, is currently conducting validation on the active cases since Saturday, June 26.
He said this is the reason why the city recorded 981 recoveries on Tuesday, June 30, currently the highest number in a day since the pandemic started. This had resulted in the active case to lower to 4,840.
"Kung makabantay mo nga ang atong recoveries gabii [June 29] is 981 recoveries (If you noticed that our recoveries last night reached 981), this is part of the validation that we are doing. Kaning atong 4,000 plus karon, mumubo pa nig 3,000 plus, hangtod ma-2,000 na lang ni atong active [cases] (Our current 4,000 plus cases could decrease to 3,000 plus, until our active cases could reach 2,000)," Lopez said in an interview on 87.5 FM Davao City Disaster Radio.
Prior to the validation process, Lopez noticed the increasing number of active cases.
"Natingala man ko, kada naa mudugang nga kaso, magsige man saka ang active cases pero wala nila ginaihap ang actual recoveries. Dapat gina-minus ang daily recoveries. Wala na-accurately validated kay (We noticed whenever we record new cases, our active cases increase, but the new recoveries were not computed. The daily recoveries should have been deducted on the active cases. It was not accurately validated) for some other reason," he said.
On June 29, the city reached 5,285 active cases, the highest since the pandemic started in March 2020.
"Ang active lang gyud diha (Our actual current active cases), retrospective 14 days, is only 2,650. Halos tunga. Katong tunga aning 5,000 plus, actually recover na ni sila. Wala lang na-validate (It’s almost half. Half of the 5,000 plus active cases are actually recoveries. It was not validated)," Lopez said.
The health office did not elaborate on the reasons for the discrepancy in the data count.
He said they are expected to finish the validation reports within the week, and they are hoping this would reflect on the DOH daily case bulletin.
Meanwhile, Lopez said they are also expecting the downtrend of cases in the city in the following weeks.
He encouraged the public to continuously comply with the minimum health protocols amid the ongoing vaccine rollout.
Davao City's modified enhanced community quarantine (MECQ) status is extended until July 15.
The city was placed under MECQ on June 5 following the surge of cases in the city that was experienced in late May this year.