The Philippines has reported its second-largest daily increase in Covid-19 infections, providing more evidence of how the virulent Delta variant may be spreading and ramping up pressure on the country's already stretched healthcare system, Reuters reports.
Hundreds of hospitals in the country are nearing full capacity, with some facilities reporting they have run out of intensive care unit beds for Covid-19 patients, leaving health care workers, who are forced to work longer hours, exhausted.
"Usually the nurse to patient ratio in wards is one to five, but we are handling up to 12 patients," said Maria Caridad delos Reyes, a staff nurse at the Philippine General Hospital, whose eight-hour shift now sometimes extend to 16 hours.
With about 11 per cent of the country's 110 million people fully immunised, millions remain highly vulnerable to Covid-19, which has killed more than 29,800 in the Southeast Asian country.
