President Rodrigo Duterte has placed the entire country under a state of calamity as the Department of Health admitted that there was now a sustained community transmission of the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19). The Health department said Covid cases are no longer tied to other cases, meaning that the source of infection could no longer be traced. The Health department reported that a fourth patient had recovered after testing negative for the respiratory disease. He said this was higher than the global fatality rate of 3.57 percent, with 5,700 deaths from more than 152,000 confirmed cases. Italy, the new Covid-19 epicenter, also had a lower fatality rate at 1.49 percent with 368 deaths out of 24,747 reported cases.

Source: Manila Times March 17, 2020 16:30 UTC