To cater to its employees who have contracted coronavirus disease (COVID-19), the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) has opened an isolation facility for them.

DSWD has converted the Social Welfare and Development Center for Asia and the Pacific (SWADCAP) in Taguig City into an isolation facility as part of its continuing initiatives for the health and safety of its employees.

DSWD Secretary Rolando Joselito Bautista led the ribbon cutting on Nov. 4 that marked the opening of the full operation of the facility.

The isolation facility, DSWD said, received a full certification from the Department of Health (DOH).

DSWD said that the facility provides a safe space for DSWD personnel to recover from the COVID-19 infection and helps alleviate their “anxiety and fear of infecting their family members.”

Bautista said that the establishment of the facility is in pursuit of the DSWD’s goal to “care for its frontliners, the angels in red vest, amid the pandemic.”

The DSWD, Bautista said, has two primordial concerns in the face of the COVID 19 pandemic.

These include the provision of assistance to the public who are most in need, as part of the Department’s disaster response, and to ensure the health and safety of the employees who continue to serve the public despite the pandemic.

In his message during the opening ceremony, Bautista shared a quote from the author, Sybil Stershic, saying that this best describes the purpose of the establishment of the isolation facility.

“The way your employees feel is the way your clients will feel. And if your employees don't feel valued, neither will your clients,” Bautista said, quoting the line of Stershic.

At the facility, employees who tested positive will be provided with safe shelter, food, vitamins, health kits, and psychosocial support.

Priority employees are those who are without isolation rooms in their own homes, those who live in dormitories, those who cannot be accommodated by facilities of local government units due to the unavailability of rooms, and those with mild symptoms.

Bautista added that the previous months tested the resilience of the DSWD as cases of employees getting infected rose.

Thus, the management had to institute stricter health and safety measures, as well as come up with innovative practices to provide utmost care to its employees.