The Department of Health reported forty-five new coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) cases in the Philippines on Tuesday, bringing the total tally to 187.
Of the new cases, the oldest is an 86-year-old woman confined at Cardinal Santos Medical Center in San Juan City. The youngest is 22 years old.
Of the 45 cases, three came from Quezon City, two from San Juan City and one each for the cities of Mandaluyong, Muntinlupa and Caloocan.
The DOH said the rest are still for validation.
Six of the newly confirmed patients are at Cardinal Santos Medical Center, 10 are at the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine, 5 at St. Luke’s Medical City in Taguig City, 4 at The Medical City, and 3 at Diliman Doctors Hospital.
The following hospitals have two confirmed COVID-19 patients each: Asian Hospital and Medical Center, Makati Health Department, Manila Doctors Hospital, Santa Ana Hospital – Manila, St. Luke’s Medical Center-Quezon City and Victor R. Potenciano Medical Center.
The Cotabato Regional and Medical Center, FEU-NRMF Medical Center, Metropolitan Medical Center RESU-NCR and Medical Center Manila and have one confirmed COVID-19 patient each.
The DOH said Metro Manila still has the most number of confirmed cases while the rest are spread out in parts of Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao.
Meanwhile, the health department bared that four patients have already recovered, the latest of which is PH25, a 31-year-old man from Negros Oriental province who was among the repatriates from the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan.
PH25 tested positive on March 9, and then later tested negative twice. The DOH said PH25 will be discharged within the day.
The health department also said there were no new deaths for today.
The country’s total COVID-19 death toll remains at 12 as of 4 p.m. Tuesday
As of Tuesday morning, the country still has 263 patients under investigation (PUIs), those who have exhibited symptoms and/or have recently traveled to a place with a confirmed local transmission of COVID-19 or were in contact with a confirmed case. 2,443 individuals are considered persons under monitoring (PUMs) or those without symptoms.
The World Health Organization lists 167,511 confirmed cases globally with 13,903 new as of March 16. China, where COVID-19 was first reported and spread, reported 29 new cases. Outside of China, there are 13,874 new cases.
Malaysia reported its first death coronavirus death, that of a 60-year-old pastor.
Malaysia recorded the highest number of COVID-19 cases in Southeast Asia with 553 cases.
Italy, the epicentre of the COVID-19 outbreak in Europe and the worst-affected country outside China, recorded 24,747 cases, with 1,809 reported deaths and 2,335 patients fully recovering. (Rommel F. Lopez)