MANILA, Philippines — The next two weeks are extremely important as this will determine if the country is able to manage the rising cases of COVID-19, Health Secretary Francisco Duque III said yesterday.

In an interview with The STAR, Duque noted these next two weeks are “important” for the country’s response to the pandemic.

“It will tell us if the (preventive) measures, the heightened response, have been effective. And how do you measure effectiveness? If you see cases going down and, hopefully, the health care system is not overwhelmed,” he added.

Duque said the rising number of COVID-19 cases “cannot be linked directly” to the presence of the UK and South African variants in the country.

He underscored that these two variants are “not as widespread” compared to the “most dominant” Hong Kong (HK) variant.
The HK variant accounts for 26 percent of swab samples sequenced, while the UK and South African variants account for three and 0.2 percent, respectively.

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According to Duque, it is also not known if it is “coincidence” that the number of COVID-19 cases rose at the time when new variants are being detected in the country.