MANILA - The Department of Health (DOH) logged 37,070 new coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) infections and 33,940 new recoveries Monday. Active cases rose to 290,938 while total recoveries jumped to 2,898,507, or 89.4 percent of the 3,242,374 infections recorded since the pandemic started in March 2020. Among the active cases, 277,020 are mild, 2,940 are moderate, 9,187 are asymptomatic, 1,480 are severe, and 304 are critical. "Of the 37,070 reported cases today, 36,001 (97 percent) occurred within the recent 14 days - Jan. 4, 2021 to Jan. 17, 2022," the DOH said. The regions with the most cases in the past two weeks were the National Capital Region (NCR) with 13,061 or 36 percent of new infections; Region 4-A (Calabarzon), 9,048 or 25 percent; and Central Luzon, 4,173 or 12 percent. The death toll is now at 52,929 with the addition of 23 new fatalities, representing 1.63 percent of overall cases. "Of the 23 deaths, 20 occurred in January 2022 (87 percent), 1 in September 2021 (4 percent), 1 in April 2021 (4 percent), and 1 in September 2020 (4 percent) due to the late encoding of death information to COVIDKaya," the DOH stated. Data dated January 15 show that about 46 percent of the 77,410 who were tested, have turned out positive for Covid-19. "About 94 duplicates were removed from the total case count as 64 of these are recoveries and one is a death," the department said. Meanwhile, two cases previously tagged as recoveries were reclassified as deaths after validation. All laboratories were operational on January 15 but 12 were not able to submit their data to the Covid-19 Document Repository System. The DOH said the 12 laboratories contribute, on average, 5.1 percent of samples tested, and 5.1 percent among positive individuals based on data in the past 14 days. To date, 49 percent of 3,500 intensive care unit (ICU) beds, 47 percent of 20,200 isolation beds, 50 percent of 14,300 ward beds, and 22 percent of 3,000 ventilators are used by patients with Covid-19 nationwide. Meanwhile, 58 percent of 1,100 ICU beds, 48 percent of 5,000 isolation beds, 62 percent of 4,600 ward beds, and 30 percent of 1,000 ventilators dedicated to patients with Covid-19 are in use in the NCR. (PNA) }