Initial test yields negative result for Zambales woman under probe for nCov

IBA, Zambales — The 38-year-old woman who is being monitored at a hospital here for novel coronavirus (nCoV) tested negative for the disease based on the initial laboratory findings on Monday, a local health official said.

Dr. Noel Bueno, provincial health office director, said the woman remains confined at a hospital pending the result of the confirmation test on Wednesday.

Bueno said the patient will be allowed to go home if the confirmatory tests will also yield negative results.

The woman was initially listed as a Patient Under Investigation or PUI because she had traveled with the Chinese couple who had been the first two confirmed carriers of nCoV in the Philippines.

“The patient was a passenger on the same flight that the Chinese couple took from Dumaguete City to Manila,” said Bueno.

On Feb. 6, the woman from an undisclosed town in this province had voluntarily reached out to local health workers for quarantine and monitoring, Bueno said.

The patient was immediately admitted to Pres. Ramon Magsaysay Memorial Hospital here.

Latest data from the regional office of the Department of Health showed that nine other people from Zambales are being monitored for possible nCoV infection.