IATF backs Marikina’s COVID-19 testing center

ALL SET FOR THE OPENING Marikina Mayor Marcelino Teodoro tours media around the city’s COVID-19 testing facility whose opening has been delayed by the lack of the health department’s seal of approval. —GRIG C. MONTEGRANDE

Marikina City’s much anticipated testing laboratory for the new coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has finally gotten the support of a national agency, though not of the Department of Health (DOH).

The city government said on Thursday that the Interagency Task Force (IATF) which was leading the country’s response to COVID-19 had lent its formal support to the testing center by ordering the DOH to hasten its accreditation of the facility.

“The good news is that the IATF has instructed the DOH to expedite the accreditation of the Marikina testing center so it can be opened as soon as possible,” Mayor Marcelino Teodoro said.

“This will be a part of a network of testing centers to do mass testing as prescribed by the directive of President Duterte,” he added.

Teodoro has grown increasingly frustrated with the DOH, which disapproved the city’s first laboratory due to its location on the sixth floor of the City Health Office. A separate two-story building at Barangay Concepcion Uno was then identified as the new site.

Nearly a month after the city was set to operate its testing facility, the opening has continued to be hounded by mostly bureaucratic delays. Teodoro pledged earlier in the week to push through with the mass testing, with or without DOH approval.

The mayor—who is typically more low-key than many of his Metro Manila counterparts—has not shied away from butting heads with the DOH over what he views as inexcusable and life-threatening delays.

Teodoro was an early proponent of mass testing, and he has said the city’s facility would cater to poorer residents of Marikina and its neighboring cities for free.

In a statement, the city trumpeted on Thursday the support for the facility of Interior Secretary Eduardo Año and Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea. Teodoro thanked them and the IATF for “interceding on behalf of the city.”

He added the Marikina was taking “all necessary measures to abide with the protocols and standards set by the DOH.”

Preparations for the operation of the facility have moved swiftly, with training for laboratory technicians and medical technologists set to be finished by Saturday. The equipment to be used at the center was also being calibrated on Thursday.

Teodoro reasserted that it was only mass testing that could flatten the curve of COVID-19 cases.

Marikina, which has been historically vulnerable to natural disasters, is likely the city in Metro Manila most used to dealing with crises. Teodoro has urged the DOH to see it as a partner in combating COVID-19.

“This is a whole-of-government approach where local and national agencies need to help one another,” he had said. “Desperate times call for extraordinary measures.”

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For more information on COVID-19, call the DOH Hotline: (02) 86517800 local 1149/1150.

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