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Bacolod, NegOcc implementing new approach to Covid-19 fight

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The City of Bacolod and the Province of Negros Occidental are harmonizing their respective data and operations for a new approach in curbing the spread of Covid-19.

Officials of the Bacolod City Emergency Operations Center–Task Force, the Provincial Health Office, and the Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office met Tuesday to discuss important matters about the coordination process between the two local government units.

REGULAR MEETING

Bacolod City Administrator and EOC executive director Em Ang said the coordination meeting will be regularly held weekly between the two LGUs to synchronize their operations, a press release from the city said.

The City and the Province will share their respective daily Covid-19 situationers, including the number of active cases, available quarantine and step-down facilities, data on patient extraction, and available hospital beds in the seven public and private hospitals in Bacolod.

BEST PRACTICES

Through this coordination, the LGUs will be able to share their best practices with each other, OIC-City Health Officer, Dr. Edwin Miraflor Jr., said.

“This will synchronize and harmonize the patient referrals of the two LGUs,” he added.

Assistant Provincial Health Officer, Dr. Jessica Fama, welcomed the conduct of regular coordination meetings.

Pama said the coordination between Bacolod and Negros Occidental will facilitate easy access to the healthcare Capacity Utilization Rate (CUR) of the seven hospitals in the City.

She added that this would allow “smooth communications and referrals” for hospital admission, especially those patients with severe symptoms coming from the province.

COMMAND CENTER

In Bacolod, the One Hospital Command Center System is in place, and aims to ensure that there are available hospital beds for individuals with severe Covid symptoms, the press release said.

Ang said the two LGUs have already clarified the official guidelines on the use of hotels in Bacolod as quarantine facilities during their first coordination meeting on April 16.

She said that only hotels validated by the Department of Health are allowed to function as quarantine facilities to make sure that both Covid positive and negative individuals are safe.

Hotels that accept regular guests are not allowed to operate as quarantine facilities because they will expose non-infected individuals to Covid, Ang added.

HAND-IN-HAND

PDRRMO head, Zeaphard Gerhart Caelian said, “I hope that we can interact regularly so that if we have concerns, the City can immediately address it, and likewise with the province. We have to work hand-in-hand since we are in one island.”

He stressed that the Province is campaigning on the use of “StaySafe”, the country’s official platform for health condition reporting, contact tracing, social distancing systems, and border controls.

Bacolod, through its EOC, is also endorsing the use of “StaySafe” as one of the requirements for inbound travelers, on top of the BaCTraC, that is its online contact tracing system.

“We are also recommending ‘StaySafe’ but at the end of the day, we still have BaCTraC IDs in compliance with City Ordinance No. 941. At the same time, our data officers have full access to the database of the BaCTraC System. That’s why it’s easy to track the activities of a Covid-19 positive index and their close contacts,” EOC deputy for medical, Dr. Chris Sorongon, said.

“We will also be able to identify the workplace and establishments that the index had visited,” he added.*

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