bestvue

A little bit of maintenance on the pallet lifter wouldn't go amiss.
thanks for your updates.

Raffin

Today 1,734 new cases, the Philippines stuck averaging in the upper 1,000s while many countries are experiencing falling cases. Some 200 plus backlog of results coming out. The DOH stopped showing the date of backlogs some months ago, but when they did many cases were months old. Delayed reporting is the hallmark of DOH covid statistics.
Positivity reported at 5.2%.

Deaths at 68 with the majority, 53, RDs.
Severe 756, critical 787, little change.

Detail on Feb 9 cases:









NCR 21.8%, 4A 9.4%. The two combined a lower 31.2% of total cases. NCR cities 10 out of the top 20.
Stand out number again from Cebu province and especially Cebu City, which contributed almost 60% of the province number.

https://news.abs-cbn.com/news/02/11/...igures-plateau


National chart.

Call that a plateau? Even NCR cases are slightly increasing. "Increasing not as fast nationally"? Compared to April/May 2020? It is nearly.

https://www.msn.com/en-ph/news/natio...D?ocid=BingHPC

Slow going on the vaccines. The Philippines reputation as a difficult place to do business (unless you are Chinese, of course) is I think affecting vaccine procurement from European and North American companies. As much as they might want to help a country in need they want to avoid the problems that many companies have here.

Gazza-d

I wonder how much of the government's vacillating is just kicking it down the road in the hope of freebies. I know the UK has approaching half a billion doses on order of which they need 150k ish. The rest to be donated to worthy causes. The UK government understands that to fix this problem the whole world must be vaccinated, not just the local population otherwise they will be forever fire fighting.

Raffin

Yes, the government here wants a victory on the vaccines. An opinion survey of the public out of Singapore gives the government low marks on covid:

https://www.gmanetwork.com/news/news...ays-doh/story/

Interesting that when Pinoys are surveyed on individual leaders approval rates are around 90%. But locally produced surveys don't look at specific policy areas much, like this. They like something about a leader and that is separated in their minds from policies and achievements?

Pushing Chinese, Russian and maybe Indian vaccines with questionable effectivity on the population will not do. Apart from pleading the argument that it's in the developed world's interest the Philippines does have some cards with its international export of labour and its position against China. But its leaders record over the last few years and the increases in military and security spending over health, education etc makes its case for charity difficult.

Raffin

Yesterday the 2k level of new cases breached at 2,022. Four labs did not report. Positive tests included 600 backlog with a positivity of 5.1%. Tests in progress at a higher 35.3k.
Deaths 26 with 11 RDs.
Severe and Critical both up a few at 762/796 patients.

Detail from Feb 11:


Bicol 17







NCR at 21.6%, 4A at 10.2%. The two combined at 31.8%, the same as the previous day.
Nine NCR cities in the top 20.
Valenzuala City of some concern lately to the OCTA expert panel.....increasing cases per head and latest positivity at 14%.
Central Visayas with the highest regional contribution yesterday at 27.7%.
Nearly all of them from Cebu Province and over 60% of the provincial area from the capital city. Cebu City has the worst new infections per head, but Mandaue, Lapu Lapu and Talisay cities in Cebu are also of concern. Talisay especially showing recent significant case increases. It and Lapu Lapu also have hospital occupancy rising towards levels of concern.
Other areas of concern to OCTA with cases are the cities of Passi in IloIlo and Tabuk (Kalinga) in the north. Also CDO City showing increasing positivity at 15%.
Davao City new case rise cooling off although hospital occupancy at a relatively high 50%.

https://news.abs-cbn.com/news/02/12/...vid-19-variant

The UK variant showing up more around the country. Three from Davao and 6 undetermined case locations,
The OFW from Cebu who went to Manila to apply again still not traced after staying in QC.

https://www.msn.com/en-ph/news/natio...R?ocid=BingHPC

This will slow things down a lot!



Thought this was interesting from a recent Dr John update looking at a UK ONS analysis of cases from the last 3 months. Especially 53% asymptomatic. That's in line with US figures from their CDC last November:

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/11/20/h...ess/index.html

Raffin

New cases Feb 13 were again close to 2k at 1,960, just 3 labs not reporting. Positives 1,413 with a backlog included of over 500 results, positivity 5.4%. Tests in preparation 33k.
Deaths at a much lower 12 with 4 RDs
Severe 769, critical 804, again up a little.

Details for Feb 12 cases:


MIMAROPA 23, Other Mindanao 19, OFWs 11







NCR 21.4%, 4A 9.5%...total 30.9% of national cases, a little lower again.
Central Visayas led again at 19.6% and the province of Cebu having the great majority, with 47% of its cases in the capital city, less than the day before.
Davao was the fourth highest region with 7.9%.


Cebu City new cases continue to increase at a fast rate.



..whereas in Davao City a downward trend seems firmly established.

So national cases here not showing a downward trend, even NCR cases are showing a slight increase recently, and moderate increases can be expected with a new variant likely starting in more than one region, undetected with genomic testing here slow and limited. If the much more spreadable new variant gets hold increases may be much greater. Testing in many areas looks inadequate in both size and scope. Positivity doesn't fall and stays at just over 5%.
Yesterday asymptomatic results were again under 10% (8.7%) of those tested , which has usually been the case. The figure from the UK I quoted yesterday was about half of cases there over the last 3 months and there are many other smaller data sets from other countries showing percentages well over 10. So many cases here are not being found.
Pressure is also on to open up facilities in time for summer, tourist facilities and cinemas. Even in Cebu, with its fast increasing numbers!

https://mb.com.ph/2021/01/12/iatf-ma...-variants-dot/

Raffin

Yesterday a log of 1,928 cases, a little fewer than the day before and 5 labs did not report. They included a backlog of results of over 500 out of just over 20k tests with positivity up at 6.9%. There are 33k tests in progress.

Deaths at 8 and one of them was an RD.
Severe and Critical both down significantly at 752 and 777.

Mass recoveries were 11k, bringing the Active total slightly down, by about 400, on that of a week ago to 25,918.

Details from Feb 13 cases:


Bicol 29








NCR 24.1% and 4A 8.8%, making 32.9% of national total.
The NCR cities made 11 places in the top 20, although mostly in the bottom half.
Navotas with an unusually high figure of 33 cases.

Central Visayas 15.4%. with Cebu Province having l86 less cases than the day before. Cebu City had just over half of the provincial cases.

For the past week:

11,732 cases, down from 12,005 the week before.
Deaths were 399, down from 441 the week before. Due to delays and re-classifications nothing to be read from that.
Cases maintain a daily average of about 1,700, limited by testing quantity and scope.
R still on the border at 0.9 nationally (at Feb 7).

Update on Silang, Cavite:

A fortnight ago this busy market town imposed a ban on entry without a "heath certificate". Don't know if it's still on but cases there went up by 16 over the past week. Dasmarinas, a four times more populated area to the north and nearer to the NCR had only 30 new cases and other smaller market towns in the upper Cavite area recorded much lower new cases. So I suppose they had to be concerned though whether restricting entry was justified is perhaps questionable.

Some data on the Philippines international standing:





Falling cases in some neighbouring countries....

Gazza-d

I read that the Philippines will be vaccinating their Olympic team before going to Tokyo this summer. I wonder where they are going to get the vaccine in time. Good to see they are getting their priorities sorted out.
https://swimswam.com/india-the-phill...l-get-vaccine/

Raffin

For Feb 15 a fall in new cases down to 1,685 with over 600 of them from a backlog. Only 15k were tested and the positivity was 6.8%. Only 17.8k tests are in preparation. Simply lower new cases from lower testing.
Deaths announced 2 with both of them RDs!
Lack of testing and data due to Chinese New Year?
Severe cases up 21 to 773 and critical down 4 to 773.

Detail from Feb 14:













NCR 22.8%,4A 12%. Total 34.8%. Eleven cities in the top 20. Navotas again with a high number.
QC, Manila and Navotas together make up 40% of NCR cases.
Central Visayas at 20.5%. The majority from Cebu Province, 92%, and 4 of its cities in the top 20. Cebu City contributing just under 60% of its provincial cases.
These 3 regions plus the CAR, Central Luzon and Davao made up just over three quarters of national cases.


NCR cases rising gradually...



Cebu City continues its steep rise..

No admission from the DOH of community transmission of the UK variant there, but a steep rise of that nature is a hallmark of the variant.

https://www.rappler.com/nation/doh-s...s-mrt3-cluster

Also possible transmission in Manila but again the DOH unwilling to be transparent, not even saying if they are checking for the variant there. Which of course they should be.
The presence of the UK variant in one or more areas of the Philippines does have the potential to wreck government plans to bring the economy back, especially with the delayed vaccine start. But surely better to be transparent now to the public rather than later when business openings will have to be cancelled?

https://www.gmanetwork.com/news/mone...story/?just_in

Last, the BBC have prepared these graphics on the world covid situation:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-51235105

Raffin

New cases lower at 1,391 but with 10 labs not reporting, which may be significant. Tests only 16k, positivity 5.3% and a higher 20.8k in preparation. Following the recent established pattern over 500 of the results are from a backlog.
Deaths 7..unclear yesterday from media reports if any were RDs.
Severe cases up 21, Critical up 8 at 752 and 781.

Detail from Feb 15:


Bicol 22, OFW 21, Illocos 19, MIMAROPA 11








NCR at 22.8%, 4A at 11.5%. So the total for the two 34.3%. Eight NCR cities in the top 20.
Central Visayas almost the same as the NCR at 22.6%. As has been the case recently Cebu Province accounted for nearly all of these cases and well over half were from the capital, which reported a similar number to that of the previous day.
CAR also reported over 100 cases.

No further useful statements from the DOH here on the UK variant, This is about the other coronavirus variants here....many:

https://www.gmanetwork.com/news/news...quenced/story/

A study published by the prestigious Royal Statistical Society has analysed excess deaths due to coronavirus for a number of countries. Other less detailed studies have concluded they are much greater than the official covid totals. No surprise one of the greatest differences from this study was Russia's at 6.5 times as much. UK at 1,5 times and the US at 1.3 times. The Philippines, along with many developing countries, seems not to produce the data so that excess deaths can be reliably estimated. My guess would be they are nearer to Mexico's than the US!
Dr John Campbell can tell you more:


Another detailed study published by the Economist on excess deaths:

https://www.economist.com/graphic-de...deaths-tracker

Raffin

The DOH announced a lower 1,184 cases yesterday, deceptive as there were 462 more than that found positive in the latest testing. Positivity was 6.1%. Delays in announcing positive results can lead to incorrect analysis unless averages are used. Tests coming along at a low 20.8k.


The variation in daily testing looking much greater since around October 2020, when new cases spread provincially. Positivity not falling and trending slightly above the recognised 5% control level.

Deaths higher at 53, after small numbers recently. RDs accounted for 30 of them. Death numbers day to day also affected by more reporting delays due to the greater regional spread.
Severe and critical both up to the same number.....775.

Detail for Feb 16:


Other Mindanao 15







Central Visayas with over 30% of cases. NCR down at 15.1%, 4A at 7.1% Adding CAR and Davao regions gets to 54%.
The NCR had a low 7 out of 17 cities in the top 20. Whereas Cebu had 5 with nearly half of provincial cases from Cebu City.
The OCTA group's Feb 17 report finds positivity between 10 and 18% in the top four. Cebu cities. The capital averaging more than 200 cases per day recently. Hospital occupancy at over 70% in two cities..Lapu Lapu and Talisay.
Elsewhere Tabuk (Kalinga) with both increasing cases and positivity. CDO with 12% positivity. Twelve per cent positivity in Valenzuala City is also of concern. There is a rise in Navotas cases. Smaller rises are seen recently in the cities of Pasay and Manila.
Cases are on the decline in Baguio City although positivity is still high there at 15%.
Davao City showing some decline but positivity is at a high 10%.
The group is not in favour of more opening up before vaccination is well underway. The problem is vaccination is some way off and businesses are lobbying government hard to relax restrictions soon.
The group still believes the UK variant is "possibly" spreading in some communities here, giving another reason for caution, whereas the DOH is presently sticking with saying "local transmission" only.
.

Raffin

As indicated yesterday a large backlog would be added and so the latest new cases announced is back up at 1,744, 6 labs not reporting. Testing was at 28k, with 6% positivity. DOH site down so no future test number.
Deaths 96 with 68 of them RDs. The general public and even some medical professionals will probably be alarmed at these high death figures announced every so often as they are unaware of the RDs. Information on those come low down in the DOH daily announcements. They stretch back many months, especially to July and August, and added to the regular reporting delay for deaths mean that the country has a much worse death record earlier in the pandemic and an improving one lately:



Severe and Critical reported each at 778, up just 3.

Detail from Feb 17 cases:


E Visayas 10, MIMAROPA 9, Cagayan V 8, BARMM 3









Low testing from the provinces leading to a higher showing for the NCR...34.5%. Eleven NCR cities in the top 20.
The surrounding 4A region had 9.5%, so the total for the original epicentre 44%.
Central Visayas continues its surge at 21% with nearly all from Cebu province and following the recent pattern Cebu City with 63% of those.

Some updates:

The arrival date of the first doses of the Chinese Sinovac vaccine, originally promised next week, may now be later:

https://news.abs-cbn.com/news/02/18/...avirus-vaccine

Awaiting Emergency Use Authorisation (EUA) here. from the Philippines FDA, who must now be getting government pressure!
The vaccine to be used in Brazil, Turkey and Indonesia and has been given EUA in Brazil, but their body not on an approved WHO list which this country can use to approve here. Results in the Brazil trial, the vaccines largest ,showed an overall efficiency rate of 50,4% but that may have been due to too short a period between the jabs and too many medical workers in the trials:

https://mb.com.ph/2021/01/18/sinovac...f-its-vaccine/

Another Chinese vaccine..Sinopharm..in the news here last year when it was administered to the Presidential Guard and then, unsurprisingly, no prosecution brought for that illegal act.
Reviewed quite favourably in a recent DrJohn update:



In that update he also looks at some ONS data on recent UK covid infections.
For England 18.5% of the population had antibodies October to January. He thinks that allowing for infections before October "at least 30% of the population has antibodies, probably a third".
Looking to explain the recent rapid fall in cases he thinks this may be one important factor and one which bodes well to achieve a measure of herd immunity fairly quickly as vaccines are administered at the present high rate.
For the Philippines, even allowing for large under-reporting, one cannot imagine the equivalent figure for existing antibodies at more than a few per cent. The Philippines has a plus factor with higher immunity levels from a much younger population, but here the vaccines will have to do a lot more of the work. And they are late, likely gong to be given slower and include some less effective ones.

Production of AZ vaccine for the Philippines under the COVAX facility will be sourced from S Korea, Thailand and possibly India. The maximum from AZ through the WHO's COVAX facility is about 10m doses, which won't go far here. and look like coming much later this year. Of course AZ in Europe have stopped taking new orders.

https://www.gmanetwork.com/news/news...-galvez/story/

https://news.abs-cbn.com/news/02/17/...ning-effective

At home learning pretty much a disaster here and at last the pressure is on to at least allow some trials to take place. They were previously planned to start in January but were abruptly stopped by the President when he learned about the UK variant. As of now no indication officially or otherwise that it is generally going around here. Face to face teaching can surely be started in many areas and adding time in the Summer for the existing remote learning packages, an idea recently floated, will I think just get in the way of preparations to re-start physical school attendance in some form in June.

Raffin

Yesterday added 1,901 new cases, just 4 labs did not report. Includes a 300 or so backlog and positivity from 27k individual tests was 5.9%. Tests coming along up somewhat at 34.3k.
Deaths at a shocking 157, but not really when 120 of them from the DOH validation who now says they were deaths and not recoveries.
Severe and Critical both reported unchanged at 779.

Detail on Feb 18 cases:












NCR 32.2%, 4A 8.9%...total a high 41.1%. Pasay City a surprisingly high 112 cases., a fifth of the NCR. Eleven NCR cities in the top 20.


Pasay City recent uptick....

Central Visayas at 19%, nearly all from Cebu Povince with 61% of those from Cebu City. The province had two other cities in the top 20.

Central Luzon adding 132:


CL showing a steeper rise than the NCR recently.

Cabayan and Cauayan cities are in Isabela.

Death rate up at 2.12% of cases, Just below the world average;
Some of the nearest countries in the world table shown here:


Worse than Sierra Leone and close to Spain

https://covid19stats.ph/stats

Raffin

The Philippines announced another 2,240 cases yesterday and 6 labs did not report. Highest daily total since early November. Positivity at 6.8%. Tests were of 24.2k individuals and tests in preparation 34k.
If daily case numbers continue to rise here will the DOH keep up their embargo on daily locational numbers? People will be wondering where the case rises are occurring, rumours will start circulating.
Deaths even higher than yesterday's figure at 239...but read the small print and you find that 167 of them are more RDs...one of the other mysteries of DOH statistics. They will go back many months in some cases. Case fatality rate up again to 2.16%.

More detail on Feb 19 cases:



Bicol 20, other Mindanao 22









Central Visayas 26.5%, NCR 28.4%, 4A 10.4% and Central Luzon at 6.4% of the national total.
So NCR plus 4A accounting for nearly 39% of cases. Adding in Central Visayas makes up nearly two thirds.

Nearly all cases in Central Visayas on Cebu Island and Cebu City made up 45%. But four other cities were in the top 20 today.
With a population only about 5m, less than half of the NCR the outbreak there is presently out of control and if it continues for a few more weeks some its hospitals will reach capacity. Last time this happened generals from the Task Force were sent in with great fanfare, so it will be interesting to see if that is repeated.

Pasay City, again with a higher than usual case number of 57 yesterday, imposed a 2 week lockdown on 33 barangays....actually only on about half of them that had 3 or more cases. The Chinese New Year and Valentine's Day being blamed but cases are generally on the rise in Metro Manila.

Linking here on BE non functional now so will leave you to search for more information on that if you want to.
DOH website also down at present.

Raffin

New cases on Feb 21 down a few hundred on the day before at 1.888. Positivity down a little at 6.3% Testing up at 29k and new tests coming along higher at 32k.
After the large number of deaths announced the day before 20 came today, but 12 of them were RDs.
Recoveries were again mostly kept for Sunday and came to 9.7k.
Compared to a week ago Active cases at 26,238 are up 320, by just over 1%.
Severe in hospital now 735, down 44 over the last two days. Critical up 8 over the last two days to 787.

Details for Feb 20 cases:


Other Mindanao 16








Regionally the NCR top at 26%, together with 4A at 9.2% the two added contributed over 35% of cases. Then Central Visayas with over 24%. Again nearly all from Cebu province with just over half from its capital. Three other cities on the island made the top 20 for the day.
Ten NCR cities also made the top 20, notably again Pasay City with a high 85 new cases.
Nearly 80% of the cases came from these afore mentioned regions plus CAR, W Visayas and Central Luzon.

Apart from Pasay, showing a large uptick there is also concern about rises in Malabon and Las Pinas, while recent positivity in Marikina is showing at a high 14%. Navotas is showing falls, but overall the NCR cities are averaging a 45% daily increase over the second half of last week compared to the previous 7 day's daily average. R is now back up to 1.22 in the NCR and positivity there is averaging 5%.

Probably no one big factor to account for the rises, except that testing has been too low and not so good in provincial areas, tracing not improving (after a fanfare with the appointment of a Czar last year he resigned!), and the many weeks of the resulting flat new cases were deceptive in hiding the effects of more economic activity and perhaps some fatigue in the general public. Vaccines are not coming to the rescue quickly. Apart from supply issues the Philippines reputation over vaccine litigation, especially over Dengraxia is holding up their importation.

New cases per day averaged 1,715 over the last week, compared to 1,676 the week before...2.3% up.
Deaths 80 per day , compared to 57.

NCR vs provincial deaths:


NCR deaths


Davao City deaths


Cebu City deaths

NCR deaths showing a slight rise but falling again. Davao City after many weeks of rising cases late last year with a big rise in early January. Since then figures went down and up and we need to allow for late reporting before seeing an established trend over the whole of January. Cebu City provisional deaths showing a recent rise, yet to be confirmed, following the rise in cases from late December.

On variants here:

https://news.abs-cbn.com/news/02/21/...s-of-mutations

Thirteen returning OFWs with the UK variant came back. The DOH saying no more about them but talking more about the possibility of a "Philippine variant" But the UK variant is the known threat and it is obvious the genome testing here is slow and these OFWs could well be starting more local transmission. Noticeable the DOH do not give their location.



Something the Philippines could consider as it is slow in starting vaccination and its cases are starting to rise. Dr John looking at a US journal published study making a strong case for Pfizer and Moderna to be given in 1 dose followed by a 3 month gap. Length of protection of the one dose looks to be at least 9 weeks and likely much more from Israeli data. Doubt if they will do it here though as only a minority of countries are following the UK in the one dose first policy, cases are relatively low here and they will be afraid it will show to the public they have not controlled the outbreak and vaccine provision here well.