BY ADRIAN P. NEMES III
Five more Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) firms in Bacolod City were issued notices of violation yesterday for not using the city’s baCTrac system, Dr. Chris Sorongon, deputy for medical and data analysis of the Emergency Operations Center, said.
Sorongon did not identify the BPOs but said they are enrolled in the system but do not use it just like Transcom Bacolod.
EOC records show that, as of Monday, 8,036 establishments and 432,068 individuals had registered with the Bacolod City Covid-19 Contact Tracing system as part of the strengthened local response to the coronavirus disease 2019.
Earlier, 41 out of 549 employees of Transcom Bacolod tested positive for Covid-19 and when contact tracing was conducted, the EOC monitoring team learned that the company was not using the baCTrac system.
In a video recorded statement Monday, City Legal Officer Joselito Bayatan said more employees of Transcom Bacolod, who came in close contact with their 41 infected colleagues, have also been swabbed.
On Monday, the CLO and representatives from the EOC met with the Transcom management and effected the temporary closure until today for disinfection and sanitation.
A notice of violation was also issued to Transcom for not using the baCTrac system that made it difficult for the EOC monitoring team to do the contact tracing.
Bayatan said they were told by the firm’s officials that the results of the swab tests conducted on other employees showed they were negative for Covid.
But he said they told the officials to let their employees undergo another swab test to ensure that they are indeed free from Covid before they are allowed to go back to work when the firm resumes operations tomorrow.
The EOC reiterated to the operators of BPO firms to strictly enforce the minimum health protocols because the monitoring teams are going around, to check on their compliance.
Sorongon said regular zoom meetings with the BPO firms are being conducted regularly. He added the Transcom case was a workplace transmission, that means, it will not result in a stricter quarantine status for the city. Aside from Transcom, 20 personnel of another call center were swabbed when their colleague fell ill due to Covid, but all of them tested negative for the disease.*
