De Oro execs hunt husband of infected vendor apparently fleeing tests, quarantine

CAGAYAN DEO ORO CITY——Authorities here launched a city-wide manhunt for the husband of a 30-year-old sidewalk vendor who went missing last Sunday, apparently to avoid being quarantined.

Mayor Oscar Moreno said the man should have been isolated along with eight of members of his family who had already been confined in city government-run facility.

Moreno said the missing man is common-law partner of the 30-year-old vendor who tested positive for coronavirus.

“I am not alarmed by the ten family members because they are already in the isolation unit. I am alarmed about this man. We do not know if he is infected or not,” Moreno said.

Health officials here issued an appeal to the local Maranao community to report the whereabouts of the man whom they said should be quarantined and tested for the virus.

“We are calling on the Muslim community to help City Hall locate and bring him in for quarantine,” said Dr. Joselito Retuya, the City Health Office’s chief epidemiologist.

Retuya said the man had gone missing after he brought his wife to the Northern Mindanao Medical Center.

He said the man earlier brought his wife to the city government-run Jose Borja Memorial Hospital after she complained of diarrhea.

Retuya said doctors at the city hospital suspected something was wrong because earlier on Friday (July 10), her sister, also a sidewalk vendor, died of diarrhea and fever.

The 20-year-old sister died last Friday at home at the village of 35 and was never tested for coronavirus.

Retuya said the younger sister was buried immediately at the Bolonsiri public cemetery.

Moreno has ordered the village of 35, an urban poor community of about 1,000 families, on lockdown for 14 days.

Retuya said the 30-year-old vendor is the 97th COVID-19 case in Cagayan de Oro, and was one of the cases of local transmission of the virus.

TSB