It's two days before Christmas and the situation doesn't look good for a festive occasion.

Many have departed for various holiday destinations. Others are leaving for a hometown reunion. And as the virus continues to evolve on its own, a world that is tired of all these health protocol mandates and quarantine and isolation requirements and whose economies have fallen face first on the ground is teetering on thin ice with Omicron on top of Delta.

Yesterday saw many countries with soaring numbers. The top five countries were: USA, UK, France, Spain and Germany. The US led in highest number of new deaths for a single day. Russia came in second with most deaths.

The Health Agency announces 288 new cases and with more cases than recoveries, the total recovered stay above 9,000. The new cases stem from more than 32,000 tests done last December 21 with a 1.1% positivity rate. Again, there were 13 laboratories that did not submit test results (2 not operation and 11 unable to submit data) and accounts for 9.1% of the total samples or 4% of the positive cases for the day.

An additional 65 people were announced to have died from COVID-19 (many of which are backlog reports).