The number of close contacts of the Finnish woman, the first detected case of the Omicron BA.2.12 variant of COVID-19 in the country, has gone up to 44, Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said Thursday.
Vergeire, in a message to reporters, said that based on their current contact tracing, nine were in Quezon City, five were in Benguet, and 30 were from the plane she rode going to Manila.
The Department of Health (DOH) announced on Wednesday the Philippines has detected its first case of Omicron BA.2.12 in Baguio City, in a 52-year-old Finnish female who arrived from Finland on April 2.
The unnamed Finnish woman was not required to undergo routine isolation at a quarantine facility because she was fully vaccinated against COVID-19 and arrived asymptomatic, the DOH said.
The DOH said the Finnish national has finished her seven-day isolation and has recovered and has been discharged. It added that the patient returned to her home country on April 21.
Vergeire pointed out that the BA.2.12 sublineage was “2.5 times more infective but not more severe” than the original Omicron variant of COVID-19.
The DOH earlier said at present, BA.2.12 is neither a variant of interest nor a variant of concern.
“The public can avoid all variants, whether new or currently circulating, by continuing to wear the best-fitting mask, isolate when sick, double-up protection through vaccination and boosters, and ensure good airflow,” it said.
Vergeire said it was a matter of time that the more transmissible Omicron variant would enter the country and possibly cause an increase in COVID-19 cases again.
An infectious diseases specialist on Thursday warned that the slow booster uptake could cause a new surge of COVID-19 infections in the country amid the threat of a new sublineage of Omicron.
Dr. Rontgene Solante, chief of the Adult Infectious Diseases and Tropical Medicine Unit at San Lazaro Hospital in Manila, said that the Omicron BA.2.12 subvariant is still highly transmissible.
However, he said it does not appear to cause severe infection.
“That’s what we’re concerned about right now, especially with a lot of these super spreader events, and then our booster uptake is low,” Solante said in Filipino in an interview with TeleRadyo.
Solante stressed the need for booster dose “to maintain and sustain that protection” from the vaccine as it wanes after several months.
He urged Filipinos to strictly follow health protocols and to complete their inoculation if they are still unvaccinated.
If eligible for a booster, they should get it immediately, added Solante, who is also a member of the government’s vaccine expert panel.
Solante said that both the viral vector vaccine AstraZeneca and mRNA vaccines like Pfizer or Moderna provide the same protection against
severe or critical symptoms brought by COVID-19 infection.
In a virtual roundtable discussion led by the Philippine College of Physicians, Solante presented data that two doses of AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine offer a degree of protection against hospitalization as high as 91 percent to 92.5 percent, and against death with 91.4 percent to 93.23 percent.
He also pointed out that there is “no statistical difference” between the AstraZeneca and mRNA jabs.
Solante also said both the vaccine types consistently deliver “high protection” even for vulnerable populations like senior citizens.
“It’s reassuring that whether you are given this virus vector vaccine or mRNA vaccine, the protection is optimal and robust among this population which is related with higher rate of mortality,” he said.
Dr. Sunate Chuenkitmongkol, of the National Vaccine Institute in Thailand, agreed, citing data in his country that showed that AstraZeneca provided equivalent protection against hospitalization and death when compared to the mRNA Pfizer vaccine.
Dr. Bruce Mungall, Asia Area Medical Director of the Vaccines and Infectious Diseases at AstraZeneca, said that even as a booster dose, AstraZeneca vaccine could also restore protection against serious outcomes from COVID-19 infection, same with mRNA vaccine boosters.
The Philippines on Monday started the rollout of the second booster shot in the National Capital Region but only for the immunocompromised population only, as recommended by the Health Technology Assessment Council (HTAC).
The emergency use authorization for the second booster shot was granted by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the immunocompromised, senior citizens, and frontline health workers.
However, the Health department said the HTAC is still reviewing evidence for the elderly and health workers.
Vaccine brands that are provided as second booster shots in the Philippines are AstraZeneca, Moderna, Pfizer, Sinovac, and Sinopharm.
The DOH on Wednesday recorded 195 new COVID-19 infections, bringing the nationwide tally to 3,685,029.
Based on the DOH’s latest data, the country’s active case count dropped to 10,576, the lowest tally this year.
The DOH said the top regions with cases in the recent two weeks were the National Capital Region (NCR) with 1,045, followed by Region 4-A
with 420 and Region 3 with 254.
A total of 3,614,238 patients recovered from the viral disease, while the nationwide death toll climbed to 60,215.
The DOH said the country’s bed occupancy was at 17 percent, while 5,390 were occupied, and 26,318 were vacant.
The DOH said that 21,964 people were tested, while 317 testing laboratories submitted data as of Tuesday, April 26.
