DOH Central Visayas on “full blast” contact tracing in PH’s 3rd coronavirus case

CEBU CITY—The Department of Health (DOH) in Central Visayas has started tracing people who have had contact with a 60-year-old Chinese woman found to be positive for novel coronavirus (nCoV).

Jaime Bernadas, DOH regional director, said health workers were checking hotel employees, medical workers and fellow passengers of the third person confirmed to be nCoV positive in the Philippines.

Bernadas said the woman, with four companions, arrived at the Mactan-Cebu International Airport and immediately took a ferry boat at Pier 1 in Cebu City enroute to Tagbilaran City, Bohol province where the group stayed in a hotel until she went to a hospital because of high fever.

Bernadas admitted that contact tracing for this particular case would be a huge challenge for the regional DOH office because of the number of persons who needed to be located.

The health official said the DOH will also locate the ferry boat and its passengers who may have also been exposed to the virus.

The regional director said the woman had already been discharged from the hospital in Tagbilaran City and already left the country last Jan. 31.

Epidemiology teams from the regional DOH office are leading the contract tracing.

Col. Jonathan Cabal, Bohol provincial police chief, said the police would help the DOH in contact tracing.

Dr. Cesar Tomas Lopez, spokesperson of the anti-nCoV technical working group (TWG) of the Bohol provincial government, said contact tracing is in full blast.

A nurse, who encountered the Chinese woman, had been quarantined, Lopez said.

Authorities were also able to trace persons in the hotel who had come into contact with the virus carrier, he said.

Edited by TSB