ILOILO City – The rapid tests done on two persons who helped facilitate the return here on April 11 of 40 overseas Filipino workers (OFW) stranded in Cebu yielded positive results for coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).
The two were a personnel of the Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) and a crew of Cokaliong shipping line.
“Ginpa-obra ta dayun ang ila confirmatory polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test,” according to Mayor Jerry Treñas.
While waiting for the result of the confirmatory test, the two were placed in isolation at the Diamond Jubilee Hall which the city government transformed into a temporary quarantine/isolation facility for suspected and probable COVID-19 cases.
The result of the rapid test can be hand in 30 minutes; that of the PCR takes 72 hours, said Treñas.
The PCG personnel and Cokaliong shipping line crew were part of the 32 people whose health were thought to have been compromised for having contact with the 40 OFWs (one of whom eventually tested positive for COVID-19). All of them (city government health workers and staff, personnel of the city’s Public Safety and Transportation Management Office, PCG personnel and 42 crew of Cokaliong) plus the OFWs were subjected to rapid tests.
The OFW who tested positive was a 44-year-old seafarer and resident of La Paz district.
After Treñas and Iloilo province’s Gov. Arthur Defensor Jr. expressed concern over returning OFWs, members of the Western Visayas Regional Task Force (RTF) on COVID-19 drew up protocols on this sector.
Only OFWs who test negative for SARS-CoV-2, the virus which causes COVID-19, would be allowed to return to the region.
An estimated 150 Western Visayas OFWs are currently stranded in Metro Manila which is under an enhanced community quarantine. Around a hundred of them are residents of Iloilo province.
In Resolution No. 12, the task force listed the following conditions that returning OFWs must meet “to ensure the general welfare of the repatriates and the safety of residents in Region 6”:
* OFWs shall submit their COVID-19 real-time Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) test results from their country of origin should it be available.
* OFWs shall undergo RT PCR test prior to departure from their immediate point of entry. Only those whose results are negative will be allowed to depart and accepted in Region 6. Only Department of Health (DOH)-approved tests shall be accepted as valid results.
* OFWs are required to undergo 14-day quarantine and must be asymptomatic prior to departure from their immediate point of entry.
From the Iloilo Airport in Cabatuan town, the OFWs from Manila would be boarding a vehicle to be provided by the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA) in Region 6 and they would be transported to a quarantine facility to be identified by the OCD.
However, the local government units of the OFWs may take them should they want to.
The RTF COVID-19 is composed of the Office of Civil Defense, DOH and Department of Interior and Local Government./PN
