MANILA— COVID cases in the country are decreasing, the Department of Health said Monday, adding that the decline in infections is not "artificial."

"We have already confirmed that na nakikita natin na bumababa talaga 'yung mga kaso (we are seeing that cases are decreasing) based from not just the number of cases but also the number of admission in our hospitals and the positivity rate," Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire told Teleradyo.

The country's COVID-19 tally stood at 2,666,562 infections, with 12,159 fresh cases reported Sunday.

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According to the agency's COVID-19 tracker as of Oct. 9, the bed occupancy rate in the country was at 56.5 percent or 23,073 out of 40,830 beds were occupied. However, the ICU utilization rate was 70.48 percent or 3,137 out of 4,451 ICU beds were filled.

For the past week, the country has been recording less than 11,000 coronavirus cases but the DOH had observed that testing output also fell in many regions.

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As of Oct. 7, there are over 22.8 million fully vaccinated individuals in the country. This represents 29.65 percent of the government's target population, which is more than 77 million.

Some 26 million others had received the first dose of the anti-virus jab.

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In the interview, Vergeire noted that Metro Manila's bed and ICU utilization remained high and its average daily attack rate was at 19.7 percent.

ADAR is the number of new cases over a 2-week period, divided by the population.

The capital region is still under Alert Level 4 until Oct. 15 to curb the spread of COVID-19.

Should COVID-19 cases in the country continue to drop, Vergeire said the government might relax restrictions by Christmas.

"Definitely we are looking at that. 'Yun ang ating hope, 'yun ang ating gustong makita (That's our hope, that's what we want to happen)," she said.

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