MANILA, Philippines — One employee of the Lung Center of the Philippines contracted the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outside of the hospital's premises, a facility spokesperson confirmed Tuesday afternoon.
Speaking in an interview with dzMM Teleradyo, Lung Center COVID-19 command system spokesman Norbert Francisco said that this was the first confirmed case in the hospital in a month.
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"We had a 30-day streak where not a single employee in the Lung Center got sick. And after we became lax, we got a case,” he said in a mix of English and Filipino.
"When we did contact tracing, we found out that it didn't come from the hospital but the community," he added, disclosing that the employee in question has since been put on a ventilator to assist his breathing.
Since March, the Lung Center of the Philippines has had one wing consisting of 40 beds designated to accommodate COVID-19 patients exclusively.
Patients placed on ventilators are typically in critical condition, as this indicates that the highly contagious coronavirus has found its way into one's respiratory system.
According to Francisco, though, other Lung Center employees infected with the new pathogen are "on their way to recovery."
"Less than 5 percent survive that [procedure.] That was our warning sign but this particular employee has been pulled out of the ventilator,” Francisco said.
As of this publishing, the total case tally for COVID-19 in the Philippines stands at 18,997 with hundreds of cases still being reported daily, though the health department is firm that the daily average does "not mean that the COVID-19 situation in the country is worsening."
Despite warnings from experts in both the health sector and the academe, general community quarantine was implemented on Monday, exposing thousands of workers to an unprepared public transportation system in which social distancing is a virtual impossibility.
Francisco urged workers heading back to work to be cautious and aware of the small factors that could increase their chances of contracting the virus.
He added that practicing basic protocols including physical distancing would be helpful for possible contact tracing measures later on.
"For the simple things, don't do them at the same time, especially for employers...and then the face to face [contact] is very dangerous especially when you eat and you remove the mask. That's dangerous, and should be minimized. When conversing, don't do face to face, maybe opt for side to side...you have to be conscious with all those things and then when you go out, minimize your social circle," he said in Filipino. — Franco Luna