A health worker administrates COVID-19 vaccine in Manila, the Philippines (Photo: AFP/VNA)Hanoi (VNA) - The Philippine Department ofHealth on August 23 recorded 18,332 new cases of COVID-19, thehighest daily surge since the pandemic broke out in the country.
Manila officials alsoacknowledged for the first time community transmission due to the Delta variantin Metro Manila.
In addition, the country reported 151 new deaths, raising thetotal number of fatalities to 31,961. The total number of COVID-19 cases in this SoutheastAsian country mounted to 1,857,646 cases.
The Ministry of Health's spokeswoman Maria Rosario Vergeire saidthat the Delta variant with the ability to spread quickly is spreading throughoutthe Metro Manila area. She stated that by looking at the epidemic map,community transmission is concentrated in densely populated areas where nearly30 million people live.
According to local officials, the infection rate here has leveled offafter two weeks of imposing a strict lockdown order.
To date, just over 4 million people, or 43.5 percent of thepopulation in Metro Manila, have been fully vaccinated.
Meanwhile, Indonesia is moving to relax restrictions oncommunity activities.
President Joko Widodo said the government will graduallyrelax the regulations on the implementation of restrictions on communityactivities (PPKM) level 4 due to an improvement in some indicators.
Theresumption of community activities must still be done step by step in line withhealth protocols such as testing and contact tracing, as well as a broaderrollout of immunisation.
According to the President, the COVID-19 pandemic is not overyet and some countries are currently experiencing the third wave of COVID-19and Indonesia must stay vigilant to curb the spread of the pandemic.
According to the Indonesian Ministry of Health, the country recorded 9,604 new infections on August 23, bringing the total caseload to 3,989,060. With 842 deaths, the number of fatalities rose to127,214.
In a related development, Cambodia has so far recorded a total of 999 Delta variantinfections.
Cambodian Health Minister Mam Hun Heng said the Delta variant hasappeared in 23 provinces and cities of the country, of which the most are inPailin (270 cases) and Phnom Penh (238 cases).
The Ministry of Health reminded people to strictly comply with preventionmeasures such as wearing masks, maintaining distance and avoiding largegatherings.
The Cambodian Ministry of Health confirmed 16 deaths and 410cases of COVID-19 on August 23, including 132 imported cases. Cambodia has detected a total of 89,641 cases of COVID-19, of which 85,618 recovered and 1,808 died./.
