MANILA (UPDATED) — The Philippines on Saturday recorded 2,673 new COVID-19 cases, raising the country’s total infections to 354,338.

Of the additional recorded cases, 2,286 or 86 percent occurred in the past 2 weeks. The top regions with cases in the recent 14 days were NCR (646), Region 4A (603) and Region 3 (213)

A total of 13 laboratories out of the more than 100 accredited testing laboratories failed to submit their data on time, the health department said.

BREAKING ‼️

DOH reports 2,673 new cases today as 13 labs were not able to submit data.

NCR is no longer part of the top provinces/HUC/ICC by newly announced cases but Quezon City is. A new way of classification?

DOH also announces 73 deaths ⚠️

Charts to follow. pic.twitter.com/ka6YhSjk7o

— Edson (@EdsonCGuido) October 17, 2020

Cases of recoveries jumped by 539 over the previous day, according to the Department of Health (DOH) in its latest bulletin. The total number of recoveries stood at 295,312.

The country also recorded 73 new fatalities from the respiratory illness, taking the death toll to 6,603. Of the additional deaths, 49 occurred this month, 3 in September, 18 in August, 2 in July, and 1 in May.

Active cases in the country reached 52,423, of which 84.7 percent of the patients are exhibiting mild symptoms, official DOH figures showed.

The NCR is no longer part of the top provinces with the most number of additional cases based on Saturday's case bulletin.

But the bulletin has included highly-urbanized cities (HUC) and independent component cities (ICC) in classifying places or areas with the most number of newly-reported cases.

Quezon City is the only city in the NCR to be shortlisted among the HUCs in the country that had the most number of new cases with 143.

A total of 85 duplicates were removed from the total tally. Of these, 78 were tagged as recovered cases. A death was also removed.

Meanwhile, 14 cases initially tagged as recoveries were found to be deaths after final validation.

Watch more in iWantv or TFC.tv

The OCTA Research Group, composed of professors from the University of the Philippines and University of Santo Tomas, estimates that COVID-19 cases in the Philippines will reach 380,000 to 410,000 by the end of October.

According to the Johns Hopkins University’s (JHU) coronavirus dashboard, more than 39.3 million people have been infected by the COVID-19 globally since the start of the pandemic. Of those, more than 1.1 million have died and more than 27.1 million have recovered.

To date, the Philippines is among the top 20 countries with the most number of total COVID-19 infections, claiming the 20th spot, based on the JHU tally.