TACLOBAN CITY –– The Department of Health in Eastern Visayas (DOH-8) has encouraged local government units (LGUs) in the region to have their COVID-19 test kits.
John Paul Roca, regional information officer of DOH-8, said local officials should have their test kits considering that LGUs now have the mandate to track down persons suspected to have the virus.
Roca said their office does not have test kits, except for the swab universal transport medium they use in getting samples from persons suspected to have the virus.
“And our supply of the swab universal transport medium is getting low as the number of persons suspected to have the virus is increasing,” he said.
“(Thus), we are encouraging the local government units to have their testing kits, which we don’t have considering that they were now given the mandate to monitor patients under investigation (PUIs) or persons under monitoring (PUMs),” Roca added.
The region has 19 PUIs and 206 PUMs.
The PUIs are confined at the old building of the Eastern Visayas Regional Medical Center (EVRMC), the provincial hospitals, or in a private facility.
The PUMs undergo home isolation for 14 days.
With the possibility that the region would have more PUIs, Roca said they would expand the capacity of the EVRMC from its current 20 rooms to at least 300 rooms for PUIs.
Roca said they have asked for funding from their central office, and once the funds are available, they would start construction work./lzb