On Feb. 6, a patient who was being investigated on suspicions of having the coronavirus infection (nCoV) in the Philippines passed away, The Star reports.

Death due to pneumonia and not coronavirus

According to Eric Domingo, Undersecretary of the Philippines' Department of Health (DOH), the death was "a case of pneumonia in a patient with underlying restrictive lung disease" and not of the nCoV.

This is the second case of someone who was suspected of the nCoV in the Philippines and who subsequently passed away.

The first case involved a 29-year-old Chinese national from Yunnan who had died due to pneumonia but later on tested negative for the nCoV.

Government monitoring 215 suspected cases, total of three confirmed cases

As of Feb. 7, Domingo mentioned that the government is monitoring a total of 215 suspected cases of patients with the nCoV, of which three of them are confirmed cases.

The first two confirmed cases were a Chinese couple who had travelled to the Philippines from Wuhan city.

The 44-year-old Chinese male passed away on Feb. 1 and was the first nCoV death in the Philippines, as well as outside of China.

The third confirmed case involves a 60-year-old Chinese woman who flew from Wuhan to Cebu City via Hong Kong on Jan. 20.

Initial results of her specimen tested negative for the nCoV and she was discharged from a hospital in Bohol to return to China.

On Jan. 23, Philippine aviation authorities banned all flights to Wuhan city and repatriated 464 Wuhan tourists back to China.

Top image via Olga Kononenko on Unsplash