BACOLOD CITY –– At least 15 pregnant women in this city have tested positive for COVID-19.
City Administrator Em Ang said pregnant women are tested for COVID-19 because all patients admitted at the City Health Office (CHO) lying-in clinic must be negative for the virus before admission.
“Close and skin-to-skin contact with patients during childbirth is inevitable for healthcare workers at the lying-in clinic. Thus, it is necessary to know whether they test positive or negative (for COVID-19), so that clinic staff members can take measures,” Ang said.
Testing before admission, Ang said, would protect not only healthcare workers but also the mother and her newborn child.
The Bacolod Respiratory Outpatient Center, located in front of the Public Plaza, offers free COVID-19 swab tests for pregnant women.
Most of the pregnant women who tested positive for COVID-19 had no symptoms.