5 workers of major Cebu church test positive for coronavirus

CEBU CITY—At least five workers of a major church here tested positive for SARS Cov2, the coronavirus that causes COVID-19.

In a statement on Monday (June 8), Fr. Andres Rivera OSA, prior of the Province of Sto. Nino de Cebu-Philippines, said officials of the church, Basilica Minore del Sto. Nino, received results of coronavirus tests from the city health department for 41 individuals who are staying in the church convent.

Of the 41 test results, five were positive, said Rivera.

All seven Augustinian priests assigned to the basilica were negative for coronavirus.

Rivera said when a suspected COVID-19 case was detected last May 25 in the church, those inside were already heeding health protocol to prevent a “contagion within the convent.”

The five persons who tested positive for coronavirus are still without symptoms and are on their 13th day of quarantine.

The centuries-old basilica will remain closed to the public until further notice. The faithful were advised to take part in online Masses via the basilica’s official Facebook page.

“We are not yet opening the basilica for public worship and veneration to sanitize the whole basilica compound and to strengthen its safety procedures and protocols,” Rivera said.

The basilica is home of the image of the child Jesus which was given as gift by Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan to Cebu’s Queen Juana during the first Catholic baptism in the Philippines in 1521.

“United with the Holy Trinity, we fight this virus as one in the strength of the Holy Child of Cebu,” Rivera said.

Edited by TSB