THE Department of Health (DOH) said today that not less than 79 additional cases of the Omicron subvariants of COVID-19 — BA.5, BA.2.12.1, and BA.4 — were detected in various regions in the country.
In a DOH briefing, DOH Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire reported that the new cases were recorded from July 7 to July 11, with 60 having BA.5, 17 with BA.2.12.1, and two cases with the BA.4 subvariant.
From among the new BA.5 infections, 58 individuals came from Western Visayas, and one each from Davao Region and South Cotabato, Cotabato, Sultan Kudarat, Sarangani and General Santos City (SOCCSKSARGEN).
Because of this, there are now a total of 293 cases of the BA.5 subvariant in the country, according to Vergeire.
The DOH said 43 of the new BA.5 cases were already tagged as having recovered, 14 are still under isolation, while the situation for the three others are still being verified.
One of them showed mild symptoms while the severity of the 59 other cases are still being identified.
One individual was also unvaccinated, while the vaccination status of the others are still being determined. Their exposure to the virus and travel history remains undetermined.
BA.2.12.1
Vergeire also said that six out of the 17 new cases of the BA.2.12.1 subvariant came from Western Visayas, 10 from Davao Region, and one is a returning overseas Filipino (ROF).
There are now a total of 87 cases of BA.2.12.1 already detected in the country, the DOH official said.
15 of them were already considered recovered while two are still under isolation.
Two of them showed mild symptoms, one is severe, one is asymptomatic, while the condition of the remaining 13 cases are still being verified.
The exposure to the virus and travel history are also being traced as well.
BA.4
Two more individuals, one each from Davao Region and one from SOCCSKSARGEN was added to the list of individuals who tested positive of the BA.4 Omicron subvariant.
This means there are now a total of 12 cases of BA.4 in the country based on the latest genome sequencing run.
Vergeire added that both cases showed mild symptoms and were already tagged as recovered.
One is fully vaccinated while the other one is not. Their virus exposure and travel history, however, is still unknown.
The BA.4 and BA.5, the sister variants of the original variant of BA.1 Omicron, were added to the monitoring list of the World Health Organization last March and were designated as variants of concern by the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control.
Meanwhile, the BA.2.12.1 was flagged by the United States Centers for Disease Control because of the surge of cases in the United States. Vergeire said that the BA.2.12.1 and BA.2.12 may be more transmissible than the original Omicron variant and may possess immune escape according to studies.
Yesterday, the Philippines recorded 1,660 new COVID-19 infections that brought the active caseload in the country to 14,218.