Mayor Jerry Treñas. ARNOLD ALMACEN/CMO
ILOILO City – Mayor Jerry Treñas would no longer allow home quarantine for all returning locally stranded individuals (LSIs) from other provinces and cities.
He also ordered to stop the use of rapid antibody test kits in screening these LSIs for SARS-coV-2, the virus that causes coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).
It’s difficult to ensure that these LSIs will stay inside their homes for the duration of the quarantine, Treñas admitted.
He cited several reports that some LSIs were defying health authorities’ advice to observe the mandatory 14-day home-quarantine.
“I and the Iloilo City COVID team decided to disallow LSIs to go on home quarantine,” Treñas said in a statement on Wednesday.
Arriving LSIs in Iloilo City starting today would now be housed in quarantine facilities.
“They would be isolated either in a hotel or local government facility,” the mayor added.
Yesterday, local authorities ordered the lockdown of at least 20 houses at Barangay Camalig’s Zone 5 in Jaro district after an LSI who recently returned there tested positive for the viral disease.
Camalig village head Nestor Loma said while under home quarantine, the LSI – who is now Western Visayas Patient No. 174 – had a drinking session together his relatives and neighbors prior to the release of his real time-polymerase reaction tests (RT-PCR).
Barangay Camalig was placed under lockdown on Sunday, June 21 and will last until the RT-PCR test results of the LSI’s close contacts will be released.
Loma, however, could not yet determine the exact number of the LSI’s close contacts.
There at least 100 individuals living in the 20 houses but not all of them had exposure to the patient. Last June 11, Treñas issued Memorandum Order No. 159 enforcing strict implementation of the 14-day home quarantine of all LSIs and overseas Filipino workers who will arrive in Iloilo City beginning on 16 June 2020 onwards until a vaccine to eradicate COVID-19 is readily available to the general public.
“Sa mga LSIs nga nagalagaw kag indi madakpan sang aton compliance officers, ako na lang ang madakop sa inyo ,” Treñas warned.
These past few weeks, LSIs returning to Iloilo from Cebu and other parts of the country were not required to pass RT-PCR tests. They were only asked to present a travel authority and certificate stating they completed 14 days of quarantine.
On May 25 President Rodrigo Duterte ordered concerned government agencies to bring home all overseas Filipino workers and other people stuck in Metro Manila and elsewhere due to the quarantine.
The agencies concerned were the Department of Labor and Employment, Overseas Workers Welfare Administration and Department of Health./PN
Discussion about this post