Monday, January 25, 2021

Ilocos Norte Covid outbreak; 138 cases

LAOAG CITY -- The provincial government of Ilocos Norte has upped precautionary measures amidst another Covid-19 outbreak in the province.
    Last week, Ilocos Norte recorded 138 active cases of which, 103 were in Laoag City, 18 in Batac City, and 9, 6, and 2 in Nueva Era, Bacarra, and Sarrat, respectively.
    On Jan. 11, Gov. Matthew Marcos Manotoc declared general community quarantine (GCQ) in Laoag through executive order to abate  spread of the disease.
    He said quarantine classification in the province’s capital will last “indefinitely.”
    Manotoc urged Laoag City residents to “keep parties small and as infrequent as possible. We are hoping to limit leisure and non-essential travel and minimize all sort of gatherings.”
    Earlier, the Provincial Health Office hired contact-tracers to augment  manpower of local government units.
    In Laoag City, Dr. Josephine Ruedas, OIC-Provincial Health Officer, urged residents of affected barangays who were deemed contacts of a positive cases to cooperate and participate in expanded-targeted testing. She said swab test results can now be released 24 hours after testing.
    Dr. Norman Rabago, a provincial health consultant now sheads Laoag’s more systematic and organized pandemic response:
    “One of the strategies that we use to compel people to submit themselves to swab testing is to require them with RT-PCR results if they want to go out of the lockdown area,” Dr. Rabago said.
    The majority of recorded cases were reportedly asymptomatic. The first batch of quarantined patients were released last week.
 

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