Even as the National Capital Region (NCR) shifts to a slightly more relaxed Modified Enhanced Community Quarantine tomorrow, August 21, the Department of Health (DOH) has released its latest Covid-19 case bulletin—and the news is not good.
While their infographic, which highlights the percentage of active cases, recoveries, and deaths against the aggregate total from the beginning of the pandemic, downplays the figures that should cause concern: 17,231 new cases reported today, August 20—the highest ever recorded, surpassing the previous high of 15,310 cases on April 2 this year by almost two thousand.
There were also 317 deaths reported today; in comparison, on April 2, only 17 fatalities were reported on that day.
The infographic, which also contains the positivity rates from August 18, show that 26.1% out of 64,943 tested were positive for the virus. That means more than one in four people of those tested were infected—also the highest ever recorded.
And yet, the infographic also seems to celebrate the fact that 97.3% of Covid-19 cases were mild and asymptomatic, instead of calling attention to the possible dangers of the alarmingly high figures. The accompanying tweet also failed to mention the relevant numbers.
“Why isn’t the [number of] new cases clear? That should be in a big font size!” one Twitter user said in Filipino.
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