BY GILBERT P. BAYORAN
The Armed Forces of the Philippines Central Command is sending two AFP medical teams with equipment today to Bacolod City to help the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic, its commanding general. Lt. Gen. Roberto Ancan, said yesterday.
Ancan said that the two medical teams, composed of doctors, nurses and health aides, are also those who augmented the Cebu City government in minimizing cases of COVID-19 in the area last month.
The AFP medical teams will be transported by an Air Force plane to the Bacolod-Silay airport today.
While the number of COVID-19 cases is declining in Cebu, Ancan, who is native of Victorias City, Negros Occidental, said another team of medical doctors and nurses have been placed on standby at the CENTCOM headquarters in Cebu. They may still be deployed to Bacolod City if the need arises.
Bacolod Mayor Evelio Leonardia earlier asked President Rodrigo Duterte for 150 nurses, 20 doctors and 30 medical technologists to fill the post of doctors and nurses who are still on quarantine or serve as an alternates of the hospital staff on duty.
Ancan, being the AFP Central Command chief, supervises two Army infantry divisions, Air Force, and Navy units in the whole Visayas area.
Following the campaign initiated by the Office of the Presidential Adviser for Visayas and the Department of Health in Region 7, 103 AFP personnel under the Central Command, who have recovered from COVID-19, were among the 103 plasma and regular blood donors to help save the lives of COVID-19 patients.
Ancan said that the role of CENTCOM troopers is not only to secure and provide safety for the people in the Visayas but also to help those who have contracted the virus.
He also encouraged civilians who have fully recovered from the virus to donate their plasma to help patients who are still battling the infection.*
