BY JUDY F. PARTLOW
The Canlaon District Hospital in Canlaon City, Negros Oriental has temporarily shut down after a staff member had come into contact with a person who tested positive for the coronavirus disease 2019.
Assistant provincial health officer, Dr. Liland Estacion, in a press briefing late yesterday, said that Gov. Roel Degamo directed the hospital on Sunday evening to refrain from accepting patients and turn it instead into a quarantine facility.
Estacion said that a hospital staff member had come in contact with a tricycle driver, who later turned out COVID positive.
The tricycle driver is the husband of a frontliner in Canlaon City, who was earlier reported to be infected with the virus.
There are around 16 staff members who were asked to stay in the hospital for a mandatory quarantine as a pre-emptive measure to avoid exposing their respective families to the risk of Covid-19 infection, Estacion said.
The subject staff member had reported for duty at the hospital after her exposure to the tricycle driver, she added.
Three of the staff members were reactive to the rapid diagnostic test (RDT) but all of them will be throat-swabbed, Estacion said.
There are currently no new patients at the Canlaon District Hospital as they were all discharged earlier, she said.
“We will not say that it is a lockdown but consider it as a quarantine facility instead,” she said.
Estacion said the needs of the quarantined staff, such as food are being met, while contact tracing will immediately be conducted.*PNA