MANILA, Philippines?It took eight hours of waiting at the ?Dengue Express Lane? before Roberto Sarmiento?s ailing 4-year-old daughter, Nicole Beverly, could be admitted at San Lazaro Hospital at dawn on Friday.

But Sarmiento did not mind the wait. ?This is the cheapest,? said the 28-year-old janitor, who had to make the trip from his home in Balintawak, Quezon City, to Sta. Cruz, Manila.

They were given hospital bed No. 405 in a room that had six beds but was occupied by nearly 30 people.

As of Sept. 3, there were 88 dengue patients?46 males and 42 females?at San Lazaro Hospital, one of the more congested public hospitals in the city.

Pediatric ward

Most of the dengue patients were crammed into three rooms in the pediatric ward on the fourth floor with only six to seven beds each.

There was also a spillover to another room that?s supposed to be for patients of snake bites, meningococcemia and malaria (The hospital does not have these cases). There?s also a separate ward for paying patients.

2 patients per bed

?Sometimes we have to put two patients in one bed,? said Mel Pamintuan, information officer of San Lazaro?s public health service department. ?We?re a government hospital, so we can?t really turn anyone away.?

But Pamintuan added that those who were healthy or strong enough would usually be discharged early and prescribed bed rest. Only two doctors making rounds at one-hour intervals tend to the dengue patients, along with nurses stationed at the ward.

Relatives

The rooms labeled ?DHF,? which stands for dengue hemorrhagic fever, are thick with parents, siblings and other relatives watching over the young patients.

The rooms are well ventilated but noisy and buzzing with activity. Children?s cries and other such noises fill the air.

At lunchtime, a hospital attendant starts ladling rice and chicken adobo on plastic containers and distributing these to the families. Free meals are provided three times a day in the charity ward.

Fever for 4 days

Sarmiento?s daughter had been nursing a fever for four days, but paracetamol proved ineffective, he said.

When Nicole started vomiting and he noticed that her cracked lips were bleeding?a symptom of dengue?he rushed her to the hospital.

?I had to take her to hospital immediately. I thought that if I waited until her condition turned bad, we would end up spending a lot more,? he told the Inquirer.

Blood was extracted from Nicole?s wrist for confirmatory testing, and she was put on dextrose. She is expected to stay in the hospital for two to three days.

?I don?t know where she could?ve gotten it. None of my neighbors have had it,? Sarmiento said.

Crazy

Pamintuan, whose own daughter was afflicted with dengue more than 10 years ago, said the ward was so busy that the doctors on duty could not find the time to entertain interviews, requests for which had been piling up for weeks.

?It?s been crazy here,? she said. ?This is nothing like before. When my daughter had it when she was 10, I took her to Philippine General Hospital. It wasn?t like this.?