Covid slightly up, but now we have a lot of dengue cases in the Philippines

 Covid cases are up a bit: only 

2,371 new cases and 1 new death in the Philippines with 16000 active case being treated. But testing the population shows a high positive rate of ten, suggesting there is a lot of covid circulating around. 

 but the real story is an increase in Dengue cases: and this is all over the country.Dengue cases hit nearly 65,000 from January to June 25; 90% up from last year (staying indoors might have lessened the cases last year, but now everyone is going outside).

we don't know anyone who got covid or dengue, in the last few weeks, but we were asked for money help to transfer a patient to the next town's hospital because the local public hospital is full ... from covid? (which means isolation beds, so fewer beds for non covid patients).

Dr Angie would know what's going on, but she is still in the USA attending the funeral of her sister I'm not sure what is going on in the hospitals.

Masks are still required indoors, but only about half of people on the street wear masks, although most at the palenke are waring a mask.(open air market).

there is a bird flu epidemic in the next province,The BAI disclosed that the confirmed cases of AI subtype H5N1 were recorded in the provinces of Bulacan, Pampanga, Nueva Ecija, Tarlac, Bataan, Laguna, Camarines Sur, Sultan Kudarat, Benguet, North Cotabato, South Cotabato, Davao del Sur, Maguindanao and Isabela. meaning that there might be a shortage of fried chicken at KFC and Jolibee.

we are close to Manila, so a lot of farmers put up chicken farms for either broilers or eggs, to supply the city dwellers. We had one set up on our high fields (hard to irrigate) until a typhoon blew them down a couple years ago.

A lot of farmers last year had to destroy their pigs due to African Swine flu, so the price of pork remains high.

We usually eat fish but often eat meat for supper, and in the last year for the first time since moving here, we have been frequently been eating beef in our ulam (the soup that you put over your rice). Of course, the beef tends to be tough (and sometimes is from waterbuffalo, not cattle).

the planting season has just started, so it's too early to tell if the rice will be a good harvest. Our late winter harvest was low due to rain, and due to the irrigation water being stopped to repair the canals before the rice was ready to harvest.

Sigh.