Philippines

MANILA, Sept 1 (NNN-PNA) – The Philippines crossed a grim milestone, as COVID-19 caseload topped two million today.

The number of COVID-19 cases in the Southeast Asian country surged to 2,003,955, after the Department of Health (DOH) reported 14,216 new daily infections today.

The DOH also reported 86 related deaths, raising the country’s death toll to 33,533.

“The relatively low number of cases today is due to lower laboratory output last Monday,” the DOH said in a statement, adding that, five laboratories failed to submit the data.

MANILA, Aug. 31 (Xinhua) -- The United States can not whitewash its failure in COVID-19 pandemic response by smearing China on origins tracing, Chinese Ambassador to the Philippines Huang Xilian said Monday.

"The U.S. administration, in disregard of science and in favor of political manipulation, has persistently instructed its intelligence community to compile a so-called report on the origins of COVID-19 and released a statement slandering and attacking China," Huang wrote in an article published in the Manila Times, a daily English-language newspaper in the Philippines.

MANILA, Aug 29 (Reuters) - A row between rival factions in the Philippines's ruling party escalated on Sunday when a group led by boxing star Emmanuel Pacquiao tried to remove President Rodrigo Duterte from his role as party chairman by electing their own.

Refusing to recognise the decision, Duterte's supporters said he was still chairman and branded the other faction as "pretenders and attention seekers".

MANILA, Aug 28 (Reuters) - Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte has lifted a moratorium on casino operations in the country's top holiday island to generate taxes for its COVID-19 pandemic response, the presidential spokesperson said on Saturday.

The firebrand leader has had a longstanding opposition to gambling, halting the construction of new casinos in the Philippines, one of Asia's fastest-growing gambling markets before the pandemic.

MANILA, Aug 25 (Reuters) - Philippine activists and the families of victims in a drug war that has killed thousands view with dread the possibility of President Rodrigo Duterte staying on as vice-president for six more years after his time in the top job ends next year.

The constitution bars a re-election bid by Duterte, 76, but he said on Tuesday he would run for vice president in 2022 in order to keep up his crusade on insurgency, criminal activities and drug dealers.

MANILA, Aug 22 (Reuters) - Filipino workers who have been vaccinated in the Philippines will be allowed to enter Hong Kong from Aug. 30, Manila's labour minister said on Sunday.

Labour Secretary Silvestre Bello said Hong Kong has agreed to let overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) who received COVID-19 vaccines in their home country come and work provided they can present vaccine cards issued by the Philippines' Bureau of Quarantine.

The agreement should benefit some 3,000 workers waiting to be deployed to Hong Kong, Bello said in a statement.

MANILA, Aug 21 (Reuters) - Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte ordered the health and budget ministries to arrange payment for healthcare workers who have not received their benefits on time, following nurses' threats to resign and strike warnings by unions.

Hospitals fear that desertions of medical staff, particularly nurses, have reached a critical point just as the Delta variant sends infections cases soaring, as it has elsewhere in Southeast Asia and globally.

MANILA, Aug 16 (Reuters) - Exhausted by the COVID workload, Loui quit her job as an intensive care unit nurse at a private hospital in the Philippines earlier this year.

The 30-year old, who declined to give her last name for fear of reprisals, is among thousands of medical workers who have resigned during the pandemic, complaining of low pay and poor working conditions. Others have sought better jobs abroad.

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Southeast Asia’s top diplomats have tentatively chosen a special envoy to help deal with the violent political crisis gripping Myanmar but must wait on approval from the military-ruled nation’s leaders before announcing it, two diplomats said Tuesday.

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — The Philippines will keep having large-scale combat exercises with the United States after President Rodrigo Duterte retracted his decision to terminate a key defense pact in a move that may antagonize an increasingly belligerent China.