The Philippines ranked second to the last out of 53 countries in Bloomberg's list of "best and worst places to be" as the world starts to reopen from COVID-19, attributing the country's placement to a "perfect storm" of factors.
Bloomberg cited variant-driven outbreaks, slow vaccination and global isolation for the Philippines' most recent placement, from 43rd in May and 45th in March. The rankings can't be compared because the criteria were changed.
The COVID Resilience Ranking captures a snapshot in time, Bloomberg said, noting how these turnarounds are not guaranteed to hold "as outbreaks in the developing world continue to throw up fearsome mutations", making mention of the highly transmissible delta variant.
The Philippines is ahead of Argentina (at 53rd or last place) and behind India (50th) and Malaysia (51st) because "infections continuing to flare, restrictions still in place and faltering vaccination rollouts," Bloomberg said.
From just assessing "COVID status" and "quality of life", Bloomberg added "reopening progress" as the main indicator, specifically measuring percentage of people vaccinated, severity of lockdowns, flight capacity, and vaccinated travel routes.
The pivot ushered in "dramatic changes to the ranks", said Bloomberg, as it placed the U.S. at top spot, overtaking consistent frontrunners New Zealand and Switzerland.
Bloomberg attributes the progress of U.S., which once had the world’s worst outbreak, to its "fast and expansive vaccine rollout", dominated by Messenger RNA vaccines, Pfizer and Moderna.
Switzerland, France and Spain are in the top 10 thanks to the reopening of their borders to vaccinated tourists. Immunizations also eased the strain on hospitals.
On Tuesday, the Philippines logged 4,479 fresh infections, bringing total active cases to 50,037. Since the pandemic, over 1.4 million total confirmed cases, 1.3 million recoveries, and 24,557 deaths have been logged.
As vaccines become increasingly available with the arrival of purchases and donations, the Philippines government is looking to achieve "population protection" before the end of the year, hoping to prevent and minimize deaths by vaccinating the most vulnerable to COVID-19 first.
Though restrictions recently eased in the capital, prompting a return to domestic travel, the rise in cases in regional areas, along with the emergence of virus variant, continue to threaten the country's return to normal.