MANILA (UPDATED) — The Philippines on Friday recorded 8,748 new COVID-19 cases, raising the country's overall tally to 1,037,460 million.

This is the 12th straight day that fresh infections were less than 10,000, data showed. New cases in early April went to as high as 15,000— a record high since the pandemic hit the Philippines in 2020.

ABS-CBN Data Analytics head Edson Guido said the country reported an average of almost 9,700 cases daily this month.

Remaining active infections were at 73,908, the Department of Health's (DOH) latest bulletin showed.

Of those still recovering from the respiratory disease, 95.1 percent are experiencing mild symptoms, 1.7 percent are asymptomatic, 1.3 percent are severely ill, while 1 percent are in critical condition.

The ABS-CBN Investigative and Research Group (IRG) pointed out that this is the second day that the number of active cases increased, up by 4,416 from Thursday.

It added that from April 19 to April 28, the number of those still battling the disease decreased.

The number of active cases reported in previous days was adjusted for duplicate cases, the IRG said.

There were 4,143 new recoveries, bringing the country's total to 946,318. This accounts for 91.2 percent of the Philippines' cumulative cases.

According to the ABS-CBN IRG, recoveries announced from April 18 to 29 ranged from 6,636 to 72,607.

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Friday's fresh recuperations is considered the lowest announced in 13 days, when the health department started its time-based recovery tagging.

• READ: COVID-19: ‘Mass recovery’ tagging now daily in bid to address skewed data, says DOH

COVID-related fatalities, meanwhile, went up by 89 to 17,234.

Out of 54,025 individuals who underwent testing for COVID-19 on Wednesday, some 17 percent were found positive for the disease.

The DOH said 26 duplicates, 18 of which were recoveries, have been excluded in the overall tally.

Forty-six cases initially tagged as recovered also turned out to be deaths after the agency's final validation.

Five laboratories failed to submit data on time.