EXTENDED QUARANTINE. The 164 fishermen who are now quarantined at a patient care center in Dumaguete City will have to extend their stay for at least another seven days. This, after 13 of them were found to be positive of Covid-19. (PNA file photo by Judy Flores Partlow)
DUMAGUETE CITY – The 164 fishermen who have been under quarantine since their arrival in Negros Oriental last month will have to stay an extra number of days at the patient care centers (PPCs) here after a number of them were found positive of the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19).
Adrian Sedillo, executive director of the provincial Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-EID), in an interview on Thursday, said the fishermen were scheduled to complete the mandatory 14-day quarantine on Friday, June 5.
However, since 13 of them were found to be Covid-19 positive, they will have to stay another seven days in quarantine while repeat tests are conducted on the infected fishermen.
The "pescadores" disembarked from the vessel Phillip D.R. last May 21 from a fishing expedition in Palawan.
Since their arrival here, all of them were brought to a PCC while throat swab samples for Covid-19 testing were done immediately on the same day.
The test results came back from a testing center in Cebu just recently, and in batches, revealing 13 cases of infection.
Two of them are now at the Negros Oriental Provincial Hospital (NOPH) while the rest have been transferred to another PCC also in this capital, Sedillo said. (PNA)
