The Quezon City government has been able to identify more cases of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) due to its intensified testing and contact tracing efforts.
Citing the recent report by the OCTA Research Group, Mayor Joy Belmonte said the average number of new cases per day is at 420 for the week of May 4 to 10.
This resulted in a reproduction number of 1.02 and a positivity rate of 15 percent.
Belmonte assured the city residents that this is because of the city’s ramped up testing efforts in identifying more residents with COVID-19.
“Over the past weeks, our numbers are on a downward trend but the decrease has been slow. While we are treating and isolating confirmed cases in order to mitigate the spread, we also expanded our testing which determines not just symptomatic patients but also asymptomatic ones,” she said.
“This intensified effort led to the enlistment of more active cases in the city,” she added.
She said the more effective way of identifying and isolating the infectious and that the slow decline in numbers is better than not identifying infectious residents at all.
The City Epidemiology and Disease Surveillance Unit has established 22 community-based testing sites operating from Mondays to Saturdays from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.
It also opened its online booking process for faster appointment scheduling of those symptomatic, with close contact, and other priority individuals such as those who will undergo medical procedures, dialysis patients and pregnant women.
On average, the city conducts around 3,026 tests per day.
With the donation of new machines from Temasek Foundation, tests could reach 4,000 a day.