COVID cases: Apayao tagged as high-risk, Abra, Kalinga, Baguio at moderate risk

MANILA - The Department of Health is monitoring 4 places in the Cordillera Administrative Region due to an increase in COVID-19 infections.

Dr. Amelita Pangilinan, assistant regional director of DOH-CAR, said Apayao province had been identified as "high risk" for the spread of coronavirus.

Meanwhile, the provinces of Abra and Kalinga, and Baguio City are currently at "moderate risk" for COVID-19, she added.

The DOH classification is based on an area's average daily attack rate (ADAR) and 2-week growth rate.

From July 15 to 28, Apayao has recorded 344 COVID-19 cases, an increase of 138 from 206 cases it logged from July 1 to 14, figures from DOH show.

COVID-19 cases in Baguio City decreased to 630 in the past 2 weeks but its ADAR was at 12 percent. It had 792 coronavirus cases from July 1 to 14.

For Abra and Kalinga, both provinces reported growth in cases with 2 and 75 new infections, respectively.

As of Thursday, the region has tallied 43,452 cases, of which over 41,300 have recovered while 810 have died from the disease. It currently has 1,332 active cases.

Baguio City had the most infections at 15,505, followed by Benguet with 9,936 and Kalinga with 5,017.

• Philippines' COVID-19 risk classification back to 'moderate': DOH

The DOH on Thursday classified CAR the lone high-risk region for COVID-19 in the Philippines.

As of July 13, the region has 167 cases from variants of concern, Pangilinan said.

Of the figure, 151 were Alpha variant (UK), 12 Beta variant (South Africa), 1 Delta variant (India) and 3 variant of interests.

"We already have local transmission of the Alpha variant here," she said in Filipino.

CAR has so far administered over 191,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccines, of which more than 114,000 were fully vaccinated.