DOH reports 8 ‘active’ new variant cases

THERE are at least eight active cases of Covid delta variant currently in the country after the detected cases were “immediately re-assessed,” the Department of Health said on Tuesday.

At a media forum on Tuesday, Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire, however said, when they looked at the cases closely, they have high clyde threshold (CT) value. CT value emerges in RT-PCR tests for the Covid-19, and determines whether a person is positive or not.

“Ibig sabihin mababa ang viral load at most likely hindi na sila infectious [Meaning they have low viral load, and most likely they are no longer infectious], but they are in quarantine now,” Vergeire said.

In the case of Manila, the specimen of one of the contacts who tested positive but was no longer submitted for genome sequencing for the CT value did not go below 20. Mayor Francisco “Isko Moreno” Domagoso said that the threshold is 20, according to the city health office.

Vergeire said that eight of the active cases came from: Manila (1), Cagayan de Oro (5), Misamis Oriental (1), and two returning Filipinos from overseas (RFOS).

She added that the contact tracing and back tracing are being done already for the 16 cases of delta variant reported earlier.

At present, 91 contacts have been traced. Of these, eight are from the National Capital Region, 10 from Region 6, 27 from Region 10, and 46 contacts traced from returning overseas Filipinos (RFOS).

Following this development, the DOH official said that home quarantine is not being encouraged.

“We encourage facility-based quarantine,” she said noting the threat of delta variant.

When asked where the delta variant may have come from, she said. “Angassumptionnamin [Our assumption] it really came from abroad. As to the exact origin, that’s what we’re trying to find out right now.”