The Philippines' mortality rate due to the coronavirus disease is still low even if it ranked 20th among the countries with most number of cases based on Johns Hopkins University's virus tracker, a Palace official said on Friday.

"Still look at the critical mortality rate. We are still at 1.75 percent which means that although the numbers are up, we are able to take care of those who get severely or critically ill," Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said in an interview with CNN Philippines.

He said mortality rate is what matters most because "in pandemic, the fear is that many of us will die."

"Some are dying, not as many as other countries and, of course, it’s because we have improved our critical care capacity and we have, of course, learned from the past and we know how to take care of COVID patients better," Roque added.

According to John Hopkins, the United States still has the most number of COVID-19 cases with over 7.2 million infections. This was followed by India with over 6.3 million cases.

The Philippines, which is the only Southeast Asian country in the top 20, recorded 314,079 cases.

Of the 314,079 COVID-19 cases as of September 30, death toll rose to 5,562 while recoveries were at 254,223.

Roque said the laboratories which received free machines and testing kits should not collect exorbitant fees from the people undergoing COVID-19 tests.

For those who want to avail of cheaper RT-PCR tests, he said they can go to Children's Medical Hospital, the National Kidney and Transplant Institute, the Lung Center of the Philippines, and the Perpetual Help Hospital in Las Piñas.

Roque said the RT-PCR tests in those hospitals only range between P1,750 to P2,000. Celerina Monte/DMS