ILOILO – Twenty-one overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) who returned to this province on May 9 tested negative for SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).
According to Dr. Maria Socorro Colmenares-Quiñon of the Provincial Health Office, the results of the OFWs’ reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (rRT-PCR) tests were released on May 13.
The OFWs waited for the results while on quarantine at a hotel on General Luna Street, Iloilo City.
They were allowed to go home on May 14, a day after the results were released, but were told to finish 14-day quarantine in isolation facilities prepared their respective local government units.
They would wrap up their quarantine on May 22.
Their respective local government units fetched the OFWs from the hotel.
The 21 OFWs were part of the 24 Ilonggo overseas workers who returned here after over a month of being stranded in Metro Manila due to the quarantine here.
The test results of the three turned out negative. Two of them were residents of Guimbal, Iloilo and another was from San Dionisio, Iloilo.
The 24 OFWs were the third batch of Region 6 overseas workers repatriated since April. This batch was composed of 41 OFWs some of whom were residents of towns and cities in other Western Visayas provinces.
As of May 14, only four repatriated OFWs in Iloilo province tested positive for COVID-19. They were the following:
* 32-year-old male from Pavia, Iloilo (Patient No. 92), facility quarantine
* 24-year-old male from Tigbauan, Iloilo (Patient No. 46), recovered
* 26-year-old male from Tigbauan (Patient No. 47)
* 33-year-old-male from Dingle, Iloilo (Patient No. 76), hospitalized
These four were from the first and second batches of repatriated WV OFWs.
The testing of returning OFWs was a requirement set by the Western Visayas Regional Task Force on COVID-19 in resolutions No. 12, 13 and 14.
These were the three requirements:
1. OFWs must have undergone RT-PCR test with negative result conducted within seven days prior to boarding
2. OFWs must have certification that they have finished a 14-day quarantine
3. OFWs must have medical certificates that they are asymptomatic and are in good health condition/PN
