The Department of Health (DOH) on Saturday announced that the Philippines has now recorded local transmission of the COVID-19 Omicron BA.5 subvariant.
In a media briefing, Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire identified the cases as the individuals, who were earlier reported by the DOH as the first cases of the subvariant in the country, from Central Luzon.
Vergeire identified them as a 39-year-old female and 51-year-old male who tested positive for the BA.5 subvariant despite not having any travel history outside the country.
According to Vergeire, this does not mean that the subvariant has a community transmission.
"We cannot say there is really a community transmission. What we have right now is the local transmission of this subvariant. The community transmission, we still need to establish that through evidence," she stated.
Local transmission means detecting cases with a local or domestic source of infection, without any link to international sources outside of the country.
Meanwhile, community transmission refers to a large number of infections — or clusters of cases — being detected, most of which cannot be linked with existing cases.
On Friday, the DOH announced the first two cases of the Omicron subvariant BA.5 in the country.
Aside from BA.5, Omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.2.12.1. have also been detected in the country.
