TACLOBAN City – Local government units (LGUs) in Eastern Visayas will no longer be required to test locally stranded individuals (LSIs) returning to their places, but should instead subject them to strict quarantine upon arrival.
This was disclosed by the Department of Health in Region 8 (DOH-8), which has found that 65 percent of returning LSIs have been testing positive for the coronavirus disease (COVID-19).
Roderick Boyd Cerro, chief of the DOH-8 regional epidemiology and surveillance unit, said that they have sufficient evidence to prove that many of the returning residents were infected, and testing them was too resource-draining.
"They should go straight to quarantine for 14 days. Even if they will not be tested, they are considered as infected so that resources can be directed to test local transmission which is alarming," he explained.
This was pursuant to the interim guidelines on expanded testing and prioritization of testing population of Subgroups A to F.
DOH-8 Regional Director Minerva Molon stressed that only symptomatic and quarantined symptomatic returnees shall be swabbed and strictly quarantined for 14 days.
"Due to global shortage of testing kits and other supplies and limitation in local capacity for testing, there is a need to rationalize available tests and prioritize patients or healthcare workers with severe/critical symptoms, relevant history of travel/contact (Subgroup A), and patients or healthcare workers with mild symptoms, relevant history of travel/contact, and considered vulnerable (Subgroup B)," she explained.
Molon added that repeat swab was no longer necessary at the end of the 14-day quarantine. However, even those who are asymptomatic are still required to follow the mandatory quarantine period.
With this, lesser number of cases are expected to be recorded in the region despite more returning residents anticipated to arrive on July 10 after the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG-8) temporarily stopped the travel of LSIs to Region 8 from June 26 to July 9.
Meanwhile, League of Municipalities in the Philippines-Leyte Chapter Information Officer and Barugo Mayor Macel Avestruz said Leyte mayors still have the option to swab returning residents as agreed in the protocol formulated by local chief executives in the province.