COVID-19 cases declining in Cebu City? Too early to tell, says EOC
CEBU CITY, Philippines — Cebu City recorded 302 new COVID-19 cases on January 24, 2022, based on the validated report of the Emergency Operations Center (EOC).
Councilor Joel Garganera, the deputy chief implementor of the EOC, said in a press conference that this was significantly lower than the daily cases recorded last week, which peaked at 1,126 cases on January 19.
The daily positivity rate is currrently at 41.6 percent, which is still far from the 5 percent safe threshold of the World Health Organization (WHO), but is also significantly lower than the over 50 percent daily positivity rate recorded last week.
“Yes there is a decrease in the number of fresh cases for the last four days. But its too early to tell on the basis of the two week growth rate. Besidess there are lots of labs that are not able to pass on time. Today is the first day of this surge that recovery is higher than the number of fresh cases, but then again, we are like in a rollercoaster ride.”
“It’s a series of ups and downs and we never know when this will end. There’s nothing really to feel complacent nor happy because if we look at the Average Daily Attack Rate (ADAR), ideally, it should be between 1-7 per 100,000 population. And today, with 302 fresh cases, we have 30 cases per 100,000,” said the councilor.
The healthcare utilization rate averages 50 percent as well for all hospitals within the jurisdiction of the city.
Although the cases seem to be dropping in the past days, Garganera said this is not a reason to be complacent because the cases can rise depending on the behavior of the public.
“Besides, we abide by what the mayor said: ‘it aint over until it’s over.’ So we really have to be more serious in our intervention and enforcement of the DOH Protocol and the Mayor’s Directive,” he said.
For now, Garganera believes that the drop in cases may not yet be the basis for an Alert Level 2 status for the city anytime soon as it may take at least a week or two to finally see if the trend is actually going down.
The city remains under Alert Level 3 until January 31, 2022.
/bmjo
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