Aklan records 1st 2 Covid-19 survivors

THE Aklan Provincial Health Office (PHO) has registered the first two coronavirus disease (Covid-19) survivors in the province of Aklan.

Dr. Cornelio Cuachon, of PHO, said the survivors include a doctor from Boracay and a senior citizen from the hinterland town of Libacao.

Aklan has six confirmed cases of Covid-19 with no mortality. All of the patients have travel history from Metro Manila.

"The Libacao resident will be discharged tomorrow from the Dr. Rafael S. Tumbukon Memorial Hospital (DRSTMH). The Boracay doctor still needs to be quarantined for 14 days currently at the Aklan Training Center facility," Cuachon said.

"The Libacao patient will undergo 14 days quarantine at their home," he added.

Dr. Joanne Abril, head of the infectious diseases department of the DRSTMH, said doctors used "investigation drugs" to treat the Libacao patient, but added: "We could not yet consider if the investigation drug is effective. We need more results coming from the other patients.

DSWD eyes giving food packs to stranded workers in Boracay

THE Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) is eyeing to provide relief to stranded workers in Boracay Island affected by the enhance community quarantine (ECQ).

In a Facebook message, Rhea Penaflor, DSWD assistant secretary for specialized programs, said they have yet to identify the workers.

At least 155 stranded workers submitted their names to the DSWD-Western Visayas for assistance. Many of them wish to go home.

“We need to determine if some of them already received assistance from the Department of Labor and Employment. If not, we could consider giving them food packs,” she said.

Around 34 in the list are students from Nueva Ecija having their on-the-job training.

The workers were stranded because they thought the ECQ would only last until April 15. The Aklan Provincial Government, however, decided to extend it until April 30 thus operation of all public transportation including airplanes and ships is still temporarily suspended.

Doctors and Infections

By: Kalibo Vice Mayor Cynthia Dela Cruz

There are 60,000 types of germs that people come in contact with on daily basis; only 1-2 percent are potentially dangerous to normal people with normal immunity.

For doctors and other healthcare providers like me, the exposure to germs and infections are, to say the least, a daily, common experience — or as they say, “it’s part of the job.” We meet these agents of infection in our clinics, in our hospital wards and rooms, and in our community. They are found suspended on air, on the floor or on the top of contaminated objects we hold. Sometimes, they are brought by vectors like mosquitoes.

As healthcare frontliners, we are at high risk of getting infected by any of these germs, virus, or bacteria. We get flu virus many times a year but usually, we easily recover from them even without any treatment. Apart from contracting not life-threatening flu virus, there also are flu vaccines available to treat its many strains.

Due to the “hazards of the job,” we are constantly at risk of getting our patients’ common illnesses — TB, chicken pox, measles, scabies and many others, because mostly we have it already before we realize that there is an epidemic of such disease. Thanks be to God, we survive them because most of them are non life-threatening — except probably for severe types of dengue.

What further exposes as to these risks is our old practice and probably, “sense of invincibility”. As medical students and residents many years ago, we were not required then to wear masks, caps and gloves in our ordinary rounds except when we are in operating room, delivery room, isolation room and reverse isolation room. We were young then and would easily overcome them with our good immune system. We also believe that viral infection like flu is self limiting and we can recover after 3-5 days without complications. We also do not like our patients to feel insulted by wearing mask and gloves on our consultations. But this was the period before this pandemic. Things changed with the coming of the SARS virus. Whether inside a medical setting or not, everyone is wearing these protective masks especially when in public areas — a necessity including the use of sanitizer and frequent handwashing which should become new norms today and moving forward.

This new strain of corona virus which is very virulent, infectious and potentially fatal — SARS2-Covid 19 — has been changing norms, and probably, the way we run our governments, finances and personal lives. Doctors, nurses and other healthcare providers , being in the forefront of the battle, are among the first to contract the virus . I stopped counting after the 12th doctor fell on the ground. It hurts me so much! As a doctor myself, my heart bleeds for them and their respective families. These are our topnotch, selfless, passionate, idealistic, heroic doctors. They are someone’s parent, or brother, sister, husband, wife and friend. They lost their precious lives — isolated, alone and probably lonely — while helping save somebody else’s lives. We lost them due to Covid-19. They could have done more for our community and country!

We may have lost many of our assets in the medical field, but they must not leave us in vain. They left us many significant lessons, not just about this viral infection, but about living life with purpose...down to our last heartbeat. They are our heroes...our inspiration to continue fighting and beating this virus, and live even more meaningfully, beautifully, and hopefully, godly. Only then can we truly honor their sacrifices.

Yes, our doctors and health workers deserve much respect and appreciation ,not only because of their long study and difficult training , not because they are working at night while others are asleep ,but because they are risking their lives that others may live.

Opinion: My Thoughts

Kalibo Vice Mayor Cynthia Dela Cruz

On Our Covid-19 Journey

This is not an easy journey for us citizens and goverment leaders. This situation puts into test our resolve, our courage, our creativity and resourcefulness.

For the first time in our generation, we have this one common enemy — a small unseen virus yet very virulent, infectious and has brought havoc to our economy, our lives and livelihoods! We need to protect our humanity. We should put our acts together to survive this pandemic . We should put our many differences (including political) behind. We need to survive! We should have effective and well-thought plans made by our good leaders and medical expert, known and understood by all, and most importantly, fully implemented and supported by everyone.

This journey must involve two phases:
A. First phase: the Response Phase. This phase should focus at lessening the transmission, target zero or less fatality, early recovery, protection of our frontliners and our people, and timely assistance to our residents most affected by this crisis.

In a document ‘Call to Action’ written by Drs Esperanza and son Brian Cabral and Michael Sy, they shared the following four imperatives to combat Covid19 during this first phase:

1. Know your enemy. How do we act under this first imperative? We should know if our enemy is near or within us first and foremost. So “focused mass testing” is advised so we can separate the infected from not, but due to limited resources we only test those who have symptoms and were in close contact with COVID-19 patients. We should do our best to access these test kits for mass screening. Without these many tests for now, our next best option is to know the virus transmision, its incubation period and its behavior. What are we doing related to this? We aim to stop its transmission through quarantine, physical distancing, wearing of face masks ALL the time especially when in a public place, frequent use of sanitizer and correct hand washing, use of foot bath, regular disinfection and use of PPEs. These we are doing now, and are strongly advocating that we do all these or we worsen the situation.

2. Protect our frontliners: our health workers, DRRMOs, responders, the PNP and the military, our force multipliers in the barangays, and many others. Our govt is doing its best by providing them protective gears and other valuable support. Many organizations are rallying behind them donating PPEs, food and related materials — and I commend all of them! Thank you very much!

3. Protect our Covid patients. Our government is following guidelines set forth by the DOH on managing these cases. The govt is doing its best to provide the best care to them. Covid wards/ hospitals are set for them. PUIs and PUMs are managed accordingly and are being monitored by our BHERTS and Brgy officials.

4. Protect our people. Lockdowns and quarantine and curfews are being done. Massive advocacies on use of masks, proper handwashing, social distancing etc. are also stressed for their protection.

The government with its many departments is doing its best to provide support through provision of food packs and other social amelioration programs.
Institutions, companies are giving discounts, allowing delayed payments (Bayanihan Act) and other relief efforts to ease the financial burden of everyone.

Being in the middle of this Covid journey,let us look back at those four imperatives . Let us assess ourselves . What have we done personally to help in this fight against this virus? How can we help our government ? Did all our people know,understand these measures and practice them by heart?

B . The second phase of this journey is RECOVERY phase. The government will then start with stimulus programs to perk up our economy. More jobs and livelihoods will be in place. Support to mSMEs will be intensified to help earlier and faster recovery of our fellowmen. More health and welfare programs will also be in implemented. LGUs will strengthen its disasters and resiliency programs especially related to pandemics and natural disasters, learning from this experience.

Considering the rate we are going now on this journey, where increase in Philippines (Manila ) plateau at 300+ per day, (the highest was 500+ per day) without massive community transmission, we are hoping that after this plateau the curve or cases will go down.

One model at Cambridge University said that we need to be very vigilant up to May 15 if we aim to be covid-free in the shortest time possible.

Please do not let our
guards down. Stay at home.
Keep the physical distance
— for now.
Wear your masks to stop transmission.
Wash your hands as frequent as possible to kill the virus. Be positive.
Follow our government directives.

Let’s fight together
and heal together!!!
God bless us all.

—Vice Doc Cynthia DelaCruz
LGU -Kalibo 4/3/20