DOH reports 640 new Delta variant COVID-19 cases

The new Delta variant cases account for 85.6 percent of the 748 positive samples sequenced recently. Out of the 640 cases, 584 are local, 52 are returning overseas Filipinos, while four are still being verified.

The national capital region (NCR) recorded the most number of fresh Delta variant cases with 112, followed by Cagayan Valley with 52, and Calabarzon with 49. Two cases were also recorded in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (BARMM).

DOH added that among the sequenced samples, 624 are tagged as recovered, 13 as deaths, while three are still active cases.

Aside from the Delta variant cases, DOH also reported 24 new Alpha variant cases, 28 Beta, and five new P.3 variant infections.

Moreover, the health agency said that the Philippine Genome Center will be scaling down their COVID-19 RT-PCR testing services. This is to focus their resources on genome sequencing to detect COVID-19 variants.

“This shift will lead to an expected increase in the sequencing capacity and detection of COVID-19 variant cases in the country in the succeeding months,” DOH said.