DAVAO CITY – Eight vendors and one health worker tested positive for COVID-19 during “surveillance testing” at the Agdao Public Market where around 300 individuals had been subjected to reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) test last week, Mayor Sara Duterte here said Monday.
Duterte said during her live program over Davao City Disaster Radio (DCDR 87.5) that all active cases have been isolated and are currently asymptomatic, including the female health worker of Agdao Health Center who recently received the first dose of Sinovac from China.
She said that she has yet to receive a recommendation from health authorities whether or not to put the public market under lockdown.
Duterte said that additional testing was conducted at Agdao Public Market Monday which was simultaneous with the testing of vendors at the Bankerohan Public Market.
She said surveillance testing was pursued by the city government as local health authorities want to get ahead of the clustering of COVID-19 cases in high-risk areas to prevent the further spread of the virus.
Duterte said the decision of the health authorities where to hold the surveillance swabbing and testing are based on the contact-tracing reports which indicate the workplace and exposure of the active cases.
The mayor here said markets are usually among the areas where several individuals get exposed to the virus.
“If we did not conduct the testing, we would have not detected these nine asymptomatic cases. And, because they did not feel any symptoms, they would go on, immersing in the markets, in their homes, and in their communities, and this would cause a spike or a surge if we did not catch them immediately,” she said.
Duterte said that the city government is looking for volunteers who would like to get tested for the virus.
“For now, we will test as much as we can. That is our current direction. The only challenge now is how to convince people to get tested even though they do not have the symptoms,” she said.
She said health authorities have been directed to conduct daily surveillance testing in high-risk areas, including business establishments such as private offices, banks, and call centers.