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Davao City (CNN Philippines, September 26) – Forty passengers on a Manila plane tested positive for coronavirus infection at Davao International Airport, city officials revealed.
Under Davao City’s “Try and Wait” mechanism, passengers are cleaned at the airport and only those with a negative RT-PCR or reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction will be allowed to leave.
“There is a great possibility that all of these patients were asymptomatic, as upon entering the Manila airport they undergo screening tests for symptoms, such as checking their temperature,” Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte said on Friday.
All 40 patients were immediately rushed to Southern Philippine Medical Center, the city’s designated COVID-19 referral hospital.
The city government will soon implement a QR code system for contactless and paperless recording of passenger information. This will also protect front-line passengers at the airport as they will no longer have to interview passengers. Instead, passengers will need to fill out a form online or at the airport of origin before boarding a plane to Davao city.
“We will do a test run from October 7-11. We need to do a test run first to find out the problem with the system,” the mayor said. “After October 11, the QR code will be mandatory.”
This process will require passengers to use a smartphone and internet connection, and to prepare valid identification, a boarding pass, and their negative RT-PCR test result disclosed within the last 72 hours, if they already have one.
The city of Davao has recorded a total of 1,818 COVID-19 cases as of Thursday. Of this number, 1,461 recovered and 71 died, leaving 286 active cases or currently ill patients.
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