Ospital ng Tondo closed from May 11 to 24 to allow sick frontliners recover

MANILA, Philippines – The Ospital ng Tondo in Manila will be closed from Tuesday, May 12, to Sunday, May 24, after several doctors and nurses in the hospital fell sick after tending to COVID-19 patients, Manila Mayor Isko Moreno said in a briefing on Monday.

Moreno explained that hospital closure would give the frontliners “who might have contracted the coronavirus” to have the chance to “go under quarantine and rest.”

The sick health workers had been taking care of patients ever since the pandemic reached the city.

Moreno assured, however, that frontliners who would be deemed fit to work would be temporarily assigned to a different hospital, which would pave way for the decontamination of the Ospital ng Tondo.

Previously, another hospital, the Ospital ng Sampaloc, was also shut down to allow health workers who contracted the latest coronavirus strain to recover first. After its closure last April 4, the hospital reopened on April 21.

As of now, Manila has one of the highest concentrations of COVID-19 patients, with 912 — 686 of whom are under care. Of the total patients, 84 have died and 142 have recovered.

Meanwhile, over 1,000 patients are suspected of and 126 probable for carrying the disease.

Manila and the rest of the National Capital Region (NCR) are still under the enhanced community quarantine, which will end on May 15.  However, several officials are looking to extend the ECQ as coronavirus infection rates remain high in Metro Manila.

As of Monday, the Department of Health has recorded 11,086 confirmed COVID-19 cases, with 726 deaths and 1,999 recoveries.

Worldwide, over 4.102 million persons have been infected, 282,709 of whom have died while 1.408 million have recovered.

/atm