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Video courtesy of the Department of Health
MANILA (TO UPDATE) – Inbound traveler samples testing positive for COVID-19 will undergo genetic sequencing to verify the UK’s newest variant of SARS-CoV-2, the Department of Health (DOH) said on Tuesday.
The Undersecretary of Health, María Rosario Vergeire, said in a virtual briefing that there were 85 passengers recently arrived from the United Kingdom, of which one tested positive for COVID-19, 81 are negative and three still have pending results.
Vergeire said the sample has already been sent to the Philippine Genome Center (PGC) at the University of the Philippines.
“Ngayon in saka bukas (today and tomorrow), the Philippine Genome Center has started receiving samples from our labs,” Vergeire said.
Vergeire said samples from travelers from the UK and other countries affected by the new variant of the coronavirus will be included.
The health official said that the PGC can sequence samples in batches of more than 700, so they will also be collecting samples from hospitals.
Vergeire said this will allow the country to check whether any patients from November and December have the new variant that is said to be more transmissible.
“All of this will take about a week,” he said, adding that they promised the Office of the President that they will send the results by the first week of January.
As of Tuesday, no cases of the new variant of the coronavirus have yet been reported in the Philippines.
The Manila International Airport Authority (MIAA) initially announced on Tuesday a broader travel ban covering several territories allegedly beginning at midnight on December 29.
But he later removed the notice from his Facebook account, as the presidential and interagency working group on COVID-19, spokesman Harry Roque, denied that such a policy is already in effect.
In its now-deleted post, the MIAA said that passengers from the following countries are allegedly barred from entering the Philippines:
- UK
- South Africa
- Switzerland
- Italy
- Denmark
- Israel
- Hong Kong
- Spain
- Ireland
- Netherlands
- Singapore
- Lebanon
- Japan
- Canada
- Germany
- Sweden
- Australia
- France
- Iceland
- South Korea
The agency did not cite a reason for the removal of the notice.
According to Roque, citizens must wait for the guidelines of the office of President Rodrigo Duterte “within the day” on the matter.
Immigration spokeswoman Dana Sandoval said her office has yet to receive a directive from the Interagency Task Force on an expanded travel ban.
The Philippines, as of Monday, has recorded 470,650 confirmed COVID-19 cases, including 22,746 active infections, 9,124 deaths, and 438,780 recoveries.
The country’s first confirmed case was registered on January 30 in a Chinese woman who arrived from the city of Wuhan, China, where the disease is believed to have first appeared late last year.
– with a report by Jamaine Punzalan, ABS-CBN News
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COVID-19, coronavirus, COVID-19 cases in the Philippines, new COVID-19 variant, gene sequencing, Philippine Genome Center
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