MANILA (UPDATE) — A Filipino senior citizen who had not been traveling was the country's first case of omicron subvariant XBF, the Department of Health said Thursday.

The XBF, a recombinant sublineage of Omicron BA.5 and BA2.75, is associated to the recent spike of COVID-19 cases in Australia and Sweden.

"The first case detected here in the Philippines is from a Filipino senior citizen with no known history of travel, the individual presented mild symptoms, and has already been tagged as recovered," the DOH said in a statement.

• Philippines detects first XBF case, 2 new cases of XBB.1.5

The XBF is classified as an omicron subvariant under monitoring by the World Health Organization. Global experts are still characterizing the variant in terms of transmissibility, immune evasion, and ability to cause more severe disease.

"However, the local sample was detected at a time when the variant was not yet classified as a VUM (variant under monitoring)," the DOH said.

The agency earlier said the XBF sample was collected in December 2022 and was sequenced on Jan. 28, 2023.

"Variants are expected to emerge and what’s important is our cases have remained manageable through vaccination and boosters," the DOH said. "Let’s continue to assess our own risk and employ our layers of protection and through vaccination and boosters."

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LOCAL TRANSMISSION?

In a public briefing, infectious diseases specialist Dr. Edsel Salvana said there is no evidence yet that the XBF causes severe disease.

"Wala namang ebidensiya na mas nakakapagdulot siya ng mas severe na sakit. Bagamat ang nakikita nila is a potential na baka mas nakakahawa siya at mas nakakaiwas sa ating mga bakuna pero preliminary pa lang itong mga datos na 'to kaya inoobserbahan muna sa ngayon," he said.

"Because mas mataas naman ang antas natin sa pagbabakuna, hindi naman natin ina-anticipate na biglang sisipa 'yung cases natin," he added.

(There is no evidence that it causes more severe symptoms, although they are seeing a potential that this could be more transmissible and resistant to our vaccines. But these are preliminary findings which should still be observed. Our vaccination rate is also higher and we don't expect a sudden spike in our cases.)

Given that the country's first case of XBB.1.5 found in a Filipino with no travel history, local transmission of the omicron subvariant could be possible, Salvana said.

"'Yung mga ganitong klase pag nakaka-detect tayo ng walang travel history, it's possible na meron nang nangyayaring local transmission pero we have to detect more cases para sabihin natin na sustained 'yung local transmission," he said.

(Because we have detected it in someone without any travel history, it's possible that local transmission is happening. But we have to detect more cases to say that the local transmission is sustained.)

The tally of XBB.1.5 cases in the Philippines stood at 3.

• Philippines' COVID-19 cases in past week up by 9 percent

As of Feb. 15, the Philippines has 9,082 active COVID-19 cases.

Since 2020, the country has recorded 4,075,049 infections, of which 65,985 led to deaths.

To date, over 73.8 million Filipinos are fully vaccinated against COVID-19.

The tally includes 21.4 million people who have received their first boosters while 3.9 million have gotten their second boosters.

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