DOH Undersecretary and spokesperson Maria Rosario Vergeire. FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines — The three travelers from South Africa who are currently quarantined in Negros Occidental were fully vaccinated and did not show any symptoms of COVID-19, the Department of Health (DOH) said Thursday.
“They were immediately isolated once it was reported that they were from South Africa. Based on reports, the three are fully vaccinated, they do not have any signs and symptoms, they were just isolated for that purpose because they were from South Africa,” Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire told ABS-CBN News Channel’s Headstart.
According to Vergeire, the three travelers were cleared by the Bureau of Quarantine (BOQ) upon their arrival in the country last week. Authorities said they arrived in the Philippines when South Africa was still in the list of “green” or low-risk countries.
“No results yet from the RT-PCR. We are still waiting and monitoring. We are trying to coordinate also with the Bureau of Quarantine and accordingly, BOQ already said that when they released the three individuals, they were cleared by the BOQ, so extra measures are being done in Negros [Occidental] wherein they were again isolated by the local government,” she added.
The Philippine government temporarily suspended inbound flights from South Africa, Botswana, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Eswatini, Mozambique, Austria, Czech Republic, Hungary, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Belgium, and Italy from November 28 to December 15 due to the threat of the Omicron variant.
South African scientists who were the first to discover the variant said it has a “very unusual constellation” of mutations, which are concerning as they could help it evade the body’s immune response and make the virus more transmissible.