City all beat Baguio Covid-19 cases going down

CITY HALL BEAT

Aileen P. Refuerzo

BAGUIO CITY – Covid-19 numbers have shown slight improvement and gone down the past week, according to the City Health Services Office.

This, as Mayor Benjamin Magalong asked the public to continue adhering to minimum public health standards to sustain the downtrend in cases.

He suggested the use of surgical or better quality face masks for improved protection especially with the threat of the new and more transmissible variants.

City Health Officer Dr. Rowena Galpo said that although the city’s epidemic risk level remained at moderate risk as of May 10, the city fared a little better in the two indicators -- the average daily attack rate (ADAR) or the proportion of population that contracts the disease in a specified time and the two-week growth rate (TWGR) which captures how quickly the number of cases is changing every two weeks.

The city’s ADAR for May 3-10 decreased from 15 percent to 14.5 percent while its TWGR also dropped to -40 percent. 

As of May 10, the city has a total of 11,253 cases, of which 932 are active.

The city’s case recovery rate was at 89.67 with 10,091 recoveries but the fatality rate remained high at 2.04 percent or an average of two to three deaths per day.

Galpo said that of the 162 deaths, 118 had been confirmed as residents of Baguio City while the residency of the remaining 42 is still being validated.

Hospital care utilization rate also improved at 72.43 percent or high risk level from the previous critical while isolation utilization was at low risk level with 56.89 percent occupancy.

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This, as Baguio City continues to strive to improve its Covid-19) vaccination program.

As of last week, the city added another vaccination center to the three existing sites to improve the vaccination coverage in preparation for the expected influx of vaccine supplies in the next months.

Mayor Benjamin Magalong said SM Baguio offered a spacious location in its parking building which the city began using last May 11.

The city has three other vaccination mega centers at the University of Baguio gymnasium, the St. Louis University Main Gym and the St. Louis School Inc.

City Health Officer Dr. Galpo said six teams have been deployed for each site.

The mayor said they have been closely working with the Dept. of Health Cordillera under Regional Director Ruby Constantino in streamlining the procedures on vaccine deployment and administration.

He said in a meeting recently, the city and the regional office ironed out issues on the process of administering the supplies so that the city had been given some leeway in managing its allocations.

The city hopes to continually improve its utilization rate which as of May 7 is at 76.38 percent.

The mayor said the city’s vaccination process is turning out well judging from the feedback he had received from various people.

“The feedback coming from different people commending the way we are doing it here in Baguio so I congratulate our Health Services Office under Dr. Galpo and her team for a job well done,” the mayor said.

He said the process is still far from being perfect and that there are those who feel it is still wanting but there is always a room for improvement.

“Unti-untin gumaganda na.  We will continue to work on the problems areas in coordination with the concerned agencies so that we can deliver the vaccine needs of our residents as conveniently as possible,” the mayor said.