LUCENA CITY, Philippines – Health authorities in Quezon on Friday recorded two new “patient under investigation” (PUI) for the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).
The Integrated Provincial Health Office (IPHO) in a public advisory issued at 5 p.m. Friday said the new PUIs are confined in an undisclosed hospital and are being attended to by the Department of Health (DOH) and local medical workers while awaiting the result of the specimen tests from the national reference laboratory.
The new PUIs recently traveled to mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau and other countries with confirmed COVID-19 cases and had consulted doctors for coughs, cold, or which they had after returning home.
But the IPHO stressed that as of Friday: “Quezon remains negative for COVID-19 cases.”
The seven PUIs recorded earlier have tested negative for the virus and have been discharged from hospitals.
The public advisory was signed by Dr. Grace Santiago and Dr. Anneavbit Talan-De Luna, provincial medical coordinator.
The IPHO also reported a spike in their record of individuals classified as “persons under monitoring” or PUMs for possibly being carriers of the novel coronavirus.
As of Friday, the IPHO recorded a total of 131 PUMs with the addition of 29 PUMs since Thursday.
But at least 83 have completed the mandatory 14-day home quarantine period and remained healthy, the IPHO said.
The remaining 48 PUMs were still under home quarantine and monitoring.
The PUMs are those who recently returned in the country from places abroad including those who came from local areas with confirmed coronavirus cases “but showed no respiratory symptoms and were advised to go into home quarantine” immediately after their arrival in the locality. Delfin T. Mallari Jr., @dtmallarijrINQ, Inquirer Southern Luzon