DOMESTIC FLIGHTS MONITORING. File photo shows personnel of the Bureau of Quarantine (BOQ) operating a thermal scanner to check arriving passengers at the international arrival area of the Mactan-Cebu International Airport. Lapu-Lapu City Mayor Junard Chan on Monday (March 9, 2020) said he is eyeing to include the domestic flights in the monitoring of passengers, following the public health emergency declaration of President Rodrigo Duterte due to the new cases of coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) in the Philippines. (PNA file photo by John Rey Saavedra)
CEBU CITY – Lapu-Lapu City Mayor Junard Chan on Monday said he recommended to the Department of Health (DOH) in Central Visayas and the management of the Mactan-Cebu International Airport to include the domestic arrivals in monitoring passengers’ health condition.
Chan said inclusion of the Mactan airport’s arrival area in the heightened alert over the new coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) is in support of President Rodrigo Duterte’s Proclamation No. 922 declaring a state of public health emergency throughout the country.
“What we are doing now is we are focusing on travelers from identified countries with coronavirus like China and we monitor passengers. Our plan now is to include domestic flights in the monitoring,” Chan said in a radio interview.
Lapu-Lapu City is host to the MCIA.
Before Duterte’s declaration, Chan said personnel from the Bureau of Quarantine (BOQ) were focused on taking the temperatures of airline passengers from abroad.
The city government of Lapu-Lapu, he said, can lend its health workers in augmenting quarantine personnel assigned at the Mactan airport.
He said the city health office is currently deploying doctors and nurses to assist existing medical personnel who are closely monitoring passengers arriving from abroad.
The mayor, meanwhile, assured the city residents and tourists visiting Lapu-Lapu that they have imposed strict response protocol in case a person with suspected viral infection is discovered in any of the establishments in the city.
“We have already the protocol. We are meeting all hotels and resorts on what to do. We have this Incident Command Plan (ICP) team. We have a Covid-19 hotline where people can report suspected cases of viral infection within their premises.
He thanked tourism stakeholders for their cooperation over strict implementation of the protocol.
The personnel manning the hotline 24/7 operation are on standby and will immediately call the DOH and transport individuals suspected of being infected with Covid-19 to the isolation area.
Chan said he is also meeting with teachers to decide changes in policy on school activities and gatherings before summer, while the public health emergency declaration of President Duterte is subsisting. (PNA)
