WHO worried about virus spike outside MM

The World Health Organization yesterday expressed concern over the spike of COVID-19 cases being detected outside the National Capital Region.

WHO Country Representative to the Philippines Dr. Rabindra Abeyasinghe described the growing cases in certain regions as “worrying phenomena.”

“We are seeing increasing evidence of a large number of new cases being reported from Region 4-A (Calabarzon), Region 3 (Central Luzon), Region 10 (Northern Mindanao), Region 12 (Socsargen), and Region 8 (Eastern Visayas), and may be a few other regions,” said Abeyasinghe.

Based on the DoH COVID19 tracker, Calabarzon has 2,816 cases; Central Luzon, 983; Northern Mindanao, 131; Socsargen, 64; and Eastern Visayas, 367, as of last Thursday.

The increasing number of cases in those areas may be attributed to people who arrived from places that have sustained transmission of the virus that causes COVID-19.

These are locally stranded individuals in NCR who could not return to their provincial hometowns during the extended quarantine and returning overseas Filipinos, said Abeyasinghe.

“This is worrying phenomena but what we also need to recognize is that these new infections in new regions are often influenced by people traveling from infected areas where there is active transmission,” said Abeyasinghe.

“So these are what we call the return of locally stranded individuals or repatriates coming from other countries,” he added.