MANILA – The Department of Health (DOH) has detected 18 more cases of the B.1.1.7 coronavirus variant or the United Kingdom (UK) variant of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in the country.
The newly detected cases have increased the B.1.1.7 coronavirus variant cases in the country to 62 since it was first recorded in the country on Jan. 7.
“The 18 cases were among the seventh batch of 757 COVID-19 samples sequenced by the University of the Philippines-Philippine Genome Center on Feb. 18,” the Health department said on Sunday.
13 of the new detected cases were found among returning overseas Filipinos workers who entered the country on Jan. 3 to 27. They were all tagged as recovered but it is still being investigated if isolation and health protocols were complied.
Another three cases were from the Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR), including two 12-year-old boys who have contacts to the original cluster of cases from Samoki, Bontoc, Mountain Province.
The other case was from a 41-year-old female who was connected to the La Trinidad cluster. The three cases were also tagged as recovered by DOH.
Two of the 18 new B.1.1.7 coronavirus variant cases announced by DOH on Sunday, however, are still being verified if they were local cases or returning overseas Filipino workers.
Meanwhile, an additional sample reported by the DOH from Central Visayas belonging to the sixth genome sequencing batch, was found to have both N501Y and E484K mutations, which were found in South Africa and UK variants, respectively.
“The DOH, UP-PGC, and UP-NIH (University of the Philippines-National Institute of Health) are preparing to submit these new findings to the World Health Organization and the Global Initiative on Sharing All Influenza Data to aid in the ongoing global effort to track and study new and emerging genomic changes in the Sars-CoV-2 virus,” the DOH said.
Earlier, the DOH confirmed the 31 cases of COVID-19 in Central Visayas were detected to have “mutations of concern”. The department clarified that the available data was “insufficient to conclude” that these mutations will have significant implications on public health./PN
