Shortage of hospital beds, medical staff hits Ilocos amid Delta threat
LAOAG CITY, Ilocos Norte, Philippines — Healthcare facilities in the Ilocos provinces are grappling with the shortage of COVID-19 beds and medical staff just as they faced the threat of the more contagious Delta variant.
Health facilities, including quarantines and isolation centers, in Ilocos Sur province have hit capacity, said Gov. Ryan Luis Singson.
Singson said a local transmission of the Alpha (first detected in the United Kingdom) and Beta (South Africa) variants, which had infected recovered patients, was recorded in Ilocos Sur.
He said two government-run district hospitals in the province were already used exclusively to treat COVID-19 patients amid the infection surge.
On July 25, the Department of Health (DOH) announced that one of the 55 COVID-19 Delta variant cases reported in the country was traced to the Ilocos region.
Dr. Rheuel Bobis, the coordinator of the DOH’s COVID-19 response in the region, earlier told the Inquirer that a 31-year-old male patient from Ilocos Norte was infected with the variant that first surfaced in India.
According to Bobis, the patient, who contracted the disease on June 12, is a member of the Philippine Coast Guard and assigned in Currimao town.
“While [the patient] is working in Currimao, we are also currently investigating and verifying information as the case had also indicated Bacarra town as his home address,” he said.
Recovered
Dr. Christina Pingao, Currimao health officer, told the Inquirer in a text message that the patient was already tagged as a recovered case, with no signs or symptoms of COVID-19. She said 42 days had passed after the patient tested positive for the coronavirus.
Medical front-liners in Ilocos Norte also recorded a patient who contracted the Alpha variant and a second patient with Beta variant, Gov. Matthew Marcos Manotoc said.
“This is what we have suspected of late as the [viral transmission] in the province is clearly not acting how it used to,” Manotoc said in a statement.
As of Monday, Ilocos Norte had recorded 2,288 active cases while Ilocos Sur had 927.The Region 1 Medical Center, a DOH-run hospital in Dagupan City, was already preparing a medical team to augment the “exhausted” health workers at Mariano Marcos Memorial Hospital and Medical Center (MMMH&MC) in Batac, Ilocos Norte.
MMMH&MC, which is the primary COVID-19 treatment center in Ilocos Norte, reported on Sunday that it already exceeded its 104-bed capacity for COVID-19 patients, with 107 current admissions. At least 33 of its health workers were isolated after getting the virus.
Health workers from the MMMH&MC and the Ilocos Norte Medical Society had sought a “timeout” last week by appealing for a stricter quarantine status for the province.
