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Tuesday, March 19, 2024

PH last in Nikkei COVID index

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The Philippines placed last among 121 countries worldwide in Nikkei Asia’s latest COVID-19 Recovery Index that measured infection management, vaccine rollouts and social mobility.

The Tokyo-based news magazine said the Philippines, previously ranked 106th in August, was now at the bottom of its index with a score of 30.5.

The report came days after Bloomberg released its COVID Resilience Ranking that also put the Philippines at the bottom of 53 countries.

“The Philippines faces a perfect storm in that it’s grappling with the more ferocious Delta variant at the same time as it works with an inadequate testing regime and sees disruptions to its economy and people’s livelihoods as the pandemic continues to rage,” Bloomberg said.

Nikke Asia said that while new cases have dropped below 10,000 in recent days in the Philippines, the country still has a low vaccination rate and limited mobility.

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And while member-states of Association of Southeast Asian Nations were among the lowest ranked, some neighboring countries have improved their ranking due to their vaccination efforts.

Malaysia’s ranking increased from 115th to 102nd while Indonesia went up from 92nd to 54th.

The index measures the following factors: confirmed cases versus peak case count; confirmed cases per capita; tests per case; total vaccine doses given per capita; new vaccine doses given per capita; share of people who have been fully vaccinated; community mobility; Oxford stringency index; and flight activities.

Earlier, presidential spokesman Harry Roque said it was not surprising that the Philippines fell to last place in the Bloomberg list as rich countries were hoarding vaccines to the detriment of poorer countries.

Roque said the Philippines in “numerous occasions has advanced its position on the universal access to COVID-19 vaccines” because the “pandemic will not end unless the coronavirus is defeated everywhere through vaccination.”

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