ILOILO City – The Office of the Presidential Assistant for the Visayas (OPAV) is committed to help local government units of Capiz and Roxas City in their fight against coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).
“If there is anything we can do to help Capiz in ensuring it is protected from the virus, we will be very glad to extend it to the province,” OPAV assistant secretary Anthony Gerard ‘Jonji’ Gonzales said.
In partnership with the Inter-Agency Task Force for COVID-19 Visayas Chief Implementer Gen. Melquiades Feliciano, OPAV has been extending help to Region 6 in terms of improving laboratory capacity and implementing Emergency Operations Center in COVID-19 hotspot areas.
On Sept. 3, which was his first visit in Capiz, Gonzales met Tapaz mayor Roberto Palomar, followed by a Zoom meeting with Governor Esteban Evan Contreras and the mayors of Capiz.
It was during said meeting that Contreras pressed the need for additional nurses and doctors in the province since some of their frontliners have resigned, the media release noted, hence, OPAV is now coordinating with the Department of Health (DOH) to facilitate the request for augmentation of healthcare workers in Capiz and Roxas City.
It can be recalled that DOH Central Visayas sent an initial two groups of healthcare workers composed of 24 nurses to Bacolod City and Iloilo City.
OPAV also vowed its support to assist Roxas City and Capiz in the operation of their molecular laboratories.
Roxas City recently acquired a relocatable containerized reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) testing laboratory at the Hortus Botanicus grounds, which is expected to help fast track the processing of swab samples.
Currently, majority of the specimens coming from Roxas City are sent for processing to the Western Visayas Medical Center Subnational Laboratory in Iloilo City, however, the turn-around time for the results is about one week or more.
Earlier, Director Marlyn Convocar of the DOH-6 bared plans to put up a molecular laboratory at the government-run Roxas Memorial Provincial Hospital in Roxas City, which plan if realized, will cut down the turn-around time of the specimens to just few days.
OPAV returned to Capiz on Sept. 10, accompanied by DOH-7 Chief Pathologist Dr. Mary Jean Loreche and head medical technologist Prince Balaba.
It was during said visit that Gonzales met Roxas City mayor Ronnie Dadivas to discuss the latter’s concerns over COVID-19.
Dadivas thanked OPAV for its support and for visiting Roxas City as he is looking forward that OPAV, DOH, and IATF will also be able to help the city’s molecular laboratory, which is set to open soon.
Meanwhile, Loreche and the rest of the team shared the best practices of Cebu with the health officials, including testing modalities and laboratory practices of the DOH-7 molecular laboratory.
She explained the problems they faced and the practices that the Cebu laboratory implemented to be able they cope with the rising number of swab specimens.
Gonzales has been going to Capiz and other areas in Western Visayas, upon the instruction of Presidential Assistant for the Visayas Secretary Michael Lloyd Dino to determine how OPAV can help local government units strengthen their efforts against the pandemic.
OPAV has been focusing on helping Western Visayas in their fight against COVID-19 upon the direction of President Rodrigo Duterte and Senator Christopher Lawrence “Bong” Go. (With a report from PIA/OPAV/PN)
