MANILA (UPDATE) - The Philippines on Saturday reported 2,529 new confirmed COVID-19 cases, raising the nationwide caseload to 234,570.

Cases of recoveries jumped by 1,136 over the previous day, the Department of Health (DOH) said in its latest bulletin. The total number of recoveries stood at 161,668.

The country also recorded 53 new fatalities from the respiratory illness, taking the death toll to 3,790.

To date, the Philippines has 69,112 active coronavirus cases, of which 90.4 percent of the patients are exhibiting mild symptoms, official DOH figures showed.

According to the health department, many of Saturday's additional cases, or 1,171, were from Metro Manila, which remained the country's epicenter of the crisis.

The rest of new coronavirus infections were from Negros Occidental (197), Laguna (145), Cavite (117) and Bulacan (70).

As of September 3, the Philippines tested 2,569,742 individuals for the novel coronavirus, of whom 272,768 yielded positive results.

The DOH previously explained that positive results still undergo validation because some could be repeat tests or erroneous entries.

• LOOK: UP group estimates 585,000 COVID-19 cases in PH by end of 2020

The UP COVID-19 Pandemic Response Team had projected that virus cases in the country could reach more than half a million by the end of the year.

Using DOH's August 31 data, the group estimated that at least 402,821 cases to as many as 767,611 cases, or an average of 585,216 cases by Dec. 31, 2020, due to "mobility of people, detection of cases and reporting delays."

According to the Johns Hopkins University's latest COVID-19 dashboard, more than 26.6 million cases of the disease have been recorded globally, with the United States, Brazil, India, Russia and Peru topping the list among countries with most infections.

Since emerging from Wuhan City in China's Hubei province, over 874,000 people have succumbed to the disease while more than 17.7 million people have recovered.