The Department of Health has urged businesses to conduct random COVID-19 testing of their employees through rapid tests every two weeks, an official said Thursday, as the country continued to restart the economy with relaxed lockdowns.
Rapid tests detect the presence of antibodies, which only emerge between the fifth and seventh day of illness, Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said in an interview on ANC.
The test—the country has 85 testing labs—is not recommended for mass screening and should instead be used on a random sample of workers.
“This is intended to monitor the trend—if there is a (COVID case) case within your company,” Vergeire said.
The DOH also does not recommend “indiscriminate” nasal swab tests, which experts said were more accurate than rapid tests.
“Testing is a point-in-time event, meaning if you get tested today, tomorrow if you go out for work, you’ll get exposed and then maybe you’ll get the disease again…Let’s go for those high-risk individuals,” said Vergeire.
The government has expanded the testing priority to cover not just those who have other health conditions that make them vulnerable to disease, but essential workers like frontliners, public utility drivers, waiters, teachers, and bank personnel, said Vergeire.
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Flu vaccine
Vergeire, meanwhile, said the DOH had recommended the use of the flu and pneumonia vaccines to prevent complications from COVID-19, adding the department had a program to vaccinate children and elderly against flu and pneumonia.
“It can help you as a means to prevent additional complications for those already with coronavirus. We don’t discourage it, we even recommend it,” Vergeire said.
Alternative machines
The government will look for funds to buy high flow nasal cannula devices as alternative machines to ventilators to treat COVID 19 cases with severe cases, which is more effective and cheaper than the ventilator machines, Malacanang said.
Palace spokesperson Harry Roque told a press briefing health experts suggested the high flow nasal cannula therapy might be a better alternative to ventilators to assist COVID patients.
He said the use of heated and humidified high flow nasal cannula had become increasingly popular in the treatment of patients with acute respiratory failure through all age groups.
Financial support
The Philippine Health Insurance Corporation is considering the release of a second tranche of its Interim Reimbursement Mechanism or emergency cash advance to help hospitals with needed liquidity so that they can respond better to the increasing number of COVID-19 patients.
In a statement, the agency said it would review each hospital’s utilization of the first IRM tranche, and would ask them to start liquidating the funds to be eligible for the second tranche.
The second wave of IRM funds will be made available to COVID-19 hospitals specifically those in high concentration areas such as the National Capital Region, Regions III, IV and VII where bed capacity either reached full capacity or in critical levels as coronavirus infections increased due to the easing of quarantine policies.
To date, PhilHealth already released P14.7 billion to 681 hospitals nationwide under its first wave, P7.6 billion or 52 percent of which went to private institutions.
Equitable shares
The Philippines has been assured by the World Health Organization of an equitable share of the COVID-19 vaccine once it is made, the chief of the Food and Drug Administration has said.
Health Undersecretary Eric Domingo made the statement amid reports the United States and Europe have placed orders for a COVID-19 vaccine.
Domingo said there were 163 candidate vaccines being explored worldwide. Of this, 140 are in the pre-clinical studies stage. Some 23 are undergoing the three-phase clinical trials.
He said two vaccines were already in Phase 3 of the clinical trials where coverage was expanded up to 3,000 people—those created by the University of Oxford in London and China’s Sinovac Biotech firm.
House-to-house
Sen. Ronald Dela Rosa said the number of policemen to join the hunt for COVID-19 patients under home quarantine should be minimized to avoid the notion of militarization.
“The PNP (Philippine National Police) participation can be reduced to providing security to the searching teams,” he said.
He said it would be good for the PNP to avoid being accused again of militarizing the approach to a health issue despite the fact that PNP was a non- military organization.
The former PNP chief admitted the house-to-house drive to get COVID-19 patients was similar to the one done during the tokhang operations.
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