Pasig City hires 227 health workers amid hospital staff undergoing quarantine

FILE PHOTO: A hospital worker walks past a colorful mural honoring frontliners painted in front of the Mission hospital in Pasig City. More than a thousand health workers have been infected with the new coronavirus, 19 of them doctors since the start of the pandemic. INQUIRER/ MARIANNE BERMUDEZ

MANILA, Philippines — Pasig City Mayor Vico Sotto has signed the contracts of 227 health workers under “emergency hiring” as he acknowledged that concerns of hospital personnel who need to undergo quarantine remain a challenge.

Sotto, who is himself on isolation after testing positive for COVID-19, shared this development on Facebook on Wednesday, among other highlights of his virtual meeting with city officials.

“Personnel concerns (quarantine) are still a challenge. Yesterday I signed the contracts (COS [contract of service]/emergency hiring) of 28 GPs (general practitioners), 61 nurses, and 138 others (medical specialists, nursing attendants, PTs [physical therapists], etc.),” he said in the social media post.

“Cases still projected to go up. Additional contact tracers now working; now at 690; more expected to arrive,” he added.

According to Sotto, the death rate in the city during the ongoing surge of COVID-19 cases is much lower than the number of deaths during the upswing in 2021 due to the Delta variant of the SARS-COV-2 virus.

He added that the city government has reopened two more vaccination sites while another private-run vaccination site will soon open.

Registration for vaccination is ongoing via PasigPass even for minors, according to Sotto. He noted that they are still waiting for guidelines of the Department of Health for the vaccination of children aged five to 11.

The city chief executive, however, did not respond to the recent allegation of Vice Mayor Christian “Iyo” Caruncho Bernardo that the leadership in Pasig City is “puro palabas” (all for show) under Sotto. Sotto posted his weekly executive committee update Wednesday afternoon while Bernardo’s video was posted Tuesday.

In a video uploaded on Facebook on Tuesday, Bernardo likened Sotto to an actor who gets credits for the efforts of other city government officials.

Bernardo, who ran unopposed for vice mayor in 2019, is challenging Sotto in his mayoralty bid for the upcoming elections in May.

KGA