BACOLOD City – A recovered Omicron case from Metro Manila slipped through the city on Dec. 31, 2021, Mayor Evelio Leonardia confirmed on Monday. He urged city residents to calm down, even as he admitted that this city was strengthening its border controls.
The case was a 38-year-old returning overseas Filipino (ROF) – a cruise ship crew member – who planed in from the United States.
“This is apparently not a local case. This is an imported one based on the accounts made by the DOH (Department of Health) and other experts. It so happened that his genome sequencing result came out late. But just the same, we have to take precautions,” Leonardia pointed out.
Before being allowed to board a flight for the Bacolod-Silay Airport, the ROF completed the mandatory isolation and quarantine requirement in Metro Manila and had a negative RT-PCR (reverse transcription – polymerase chain reaction) test result.
At the airport, according to Leonardia, the ROF was fetched by his wife using a self-drive rented car.
The husband and wife were not Bacolod natives, the mayor also clarified. The husband was from Mindanao while the wife was from Pampanga.
The wife arrived in Bacolod on Dec. 5, applied to work at a local business process outsourcing (BPO) company, and was accepted as a call center agent.
Dr. Rosalie Deocampo, the Emergency Operations Center-Task Force (EOC-TF) cluster head for contact-tracing, presented to Leonardia important timelines involving the ROF.
* Dec. 12 – The ROF from Mindanao had his RT PCR test in Florida, USA that yielded negative result.
* Dec. 13 – He traveled from Miami to New York, where he started his 15-hour journey to Manila.
* Dec. 15: The ROF arrived in Manila at 5 a.m. and checked in at Century Park Hotel in Malate which is an Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA)-accredited quarantine facility.
* Dec. 17 – He developed symptoms, specifically sore throat, cough and colds. He blamed, at first, the hot chocolate he ingested to have caused the symptoms.
* Dec. 19 – He underwent the mandatory RT-PCR test required on the fifth day after arrival. He was already symptomatic.
* Dec. 20 – His RT-PCR yielded positive result
* Dec. 24 – The infected ROF was transferred to another Malate hotel that serves as an OWWA isolation facility for positive patients.
* Dec. 31 – He was released from isolation by the doctor at the facility, saying he had already fully recovered. He was then allowed to board his Manila-Bacolod Silay flight and was fetched by his wife at the airport.
Doctors also noted that the patient had been asymptomatic from Dec. 20 to Jan. 3.
The EOC contact-tracing cluster indicated that the ROF’s wife had a Dec. 5 to Jan. 5 booking at the Check Inn Hotel.
Deocampo said the wife had actually rented a boarding house at Barangay Singcang-Airport but was waiting for her husband to arrive before moving in.
The EOC official also said that her co-workers at the BPO company should not be alarmed because her last day of reporting was on Dec. 29 yet or, two days before she had a contact with her infected husband./PN
