ILOILO CITY, July 8 (PIA) - Compared to other areas in the country including Metro Manila and Cebu City, the Department of Health Western Visayas Center for Health Development (DOH WV CHD) clarified that Region 6 has "low community transmission" of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).

In a media release, Dr. Marlyn Convocar, DOH WV CHD Regional Director, said that the regional office considered the region to have a low level of community transmission of COVID-19.

Based on the definition of the World Health Organization (WHO), "community transmission is evidenced by the inability to relate confirmed cases through chains of transmission for a large number of cases, or by increasing positive tests through sentinel samples."

The Centers for Disease Control further explained that signals of ongoing community transmission include the detection of confirmed COVID-19 cases with no epidemiologic link to known cases.

According to the DOH WV CHD, Western Visayas has low community transmission based on the following: average of 14 confirmed cases per day for the past 14 days comprising of mostly retuning Overseas Filipinos (ROFs) and locally stranded individuals (LSIs); doubling timeof 12.4 days which is still within the 7-30 days for the number of positive cases to double; critical care utilization is still within at the safe zone at 24.4 percent; limited number of clustering of cases not interlinked or related to each other; and low mortality rate at 2.8 percent.

The DOH WV CHD reiterated that the public must continue to follow the minimum public health standards such as wearing of mask, observing physical distancing, respiratory and cough etiquette; and hand hygiene to prevent the further spread of the virus.

The DOH also recommended that the local government units shall intensify contact tracing and disease surveillance, targeted confirmatory testing for prioritized groups, isolation and quarantine of confirmed COVID-19 cases, as well as persons coming from highly endemic areas such as ROFs, LSIs, and authorized persons outside of residence. (JSC/LTP/DOH6/PIA-Iloilo)