DOH: Second person ‘under investigation’ for 2019-nCoV in Tacloban City

MANILA, Philippines — The country’s health department is monitoring a 36-year-old man in Tacloban City after showing symptoms of respiratory infection as he recently arrived from Wuhan City in China’s Hubei province, where the novel coronavirus or 2019-nCov originated.

Department of Health (DOH) Undersecretary Eric Domingo said in a press conference that the man worked in Wuhan and arrived in the country on January 17.

The 36-year-old man is the second “person under investigation” after the five-year-old Chinese boy, who also came from Wuhan and arrived early this week in Cebu City exhibiting flu-like symptoms, according to DOH.

“Meron tayo pa rin ‘yung nasa Cebu natin na pasyente na (We still have the patient in Cebu who is considered a) person under investigation and then we have another person under investigation in Region 8. It’s a male who came from Wuhan and came home to Tacloban,” noted Domingo.

However, he refused to disclose the nationality of the man, who is now in isolation in a health facility.

“Close contacts” of the patient are now under home quarantine, said Domingo.

In the same press conference, Domingo also reiterated that the country has yet to have any confirmed case of the novel coronavirus as the health department is still awaiting confirmatory test from a laboratory in Melbourne, Australia, to determine if the five-year-old boy in Cebu City was infected with the virus.

Meanwhile, five persons were referred by the Makati Medical Center to the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine but they tested negative for coronavirus, according to Domingo, adding the patients only had the regular flu.