Philippines reports highest daily number of COVID-19 cases

May 28, 2020

The Philippines reported its highest daily number of coronavirus disease (COVID) cases with 539 for a total of 15, 588,  the Department of Health (DOH) said Thursday.

The previous daily high was in March 31 when the DOH recorded at 538.

In a televised press briefing, Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said the high number was due to  enhanced capacity of laboratories to validate test results.

"These cases that we reported came from those that we have validated. So we expect that, in the coming days, the numbers may still rise as we are able to validate more cases, especially since we were already able to hire additional encoders," said Vergeire.

The DOH said earlier they expect new daily cases  to increase with the inclusion of the COVID-19 test results for overseas Filipino workers (OFWs).

"In the coming days, this will be the trend because we are now including the OFWs, who tested positive for COVID-19," Vergeire said on Wednesday.

Seventeen  fatalities were recorded, bringing to 921 the total number of COVID-19 deaths.

The DOH reported 92 new cases of recoveries among COVID-19 patients.

There are now a total of 3,598 COVID-19 patients that have recovered. DMS