Coronavirus: Philippine cases cross 1 million; Thai PM Prayuth fined US$190 for not wearing mask
- The Philippines has the second highest number of cases and casualties in Southeast Asia, next to Indonesia
- Meanwhile, Thais now face fines of up to US$640 if they don’t wear masks, while South Korea has signed a deal with Pfizer for 40 million more vaccine doses
Nearly 9,000 new infections in the past 24 hours took the country’s caseload to 1,006,428 – the second-highest in Southeast Asia after Indonesia – with 16,853 fatalities, government figures show.
Limited testing means the actual number of cases is probably much higher.
A lockdown imposed on the national capital region and four surrounding provinces at the end of March to slow a record surge in infections appears to be working.
New cases in the capital – the epicentre of the outbreak – fell 20 per cent to an average of 3,841 per day last week, data released by independent research group OCTA show.
In the capital region, an urban sprawl of 16 cities home to at least 13 million people, intensive care unit (ICU) capacity is above 70 per cent, while 57 per cent of isolation beds and 64 per cent of ward beds for coronavirus patients were occupied as of April 26.