With community transmission a large contributor, along with the country’s increased testing capacity, to the growing number of positive cases of COVID-19 in the country, which has reached 161,253 as of Sunday, the Philippine Red Cross (PRC) has volunteered to help the Department of Health release positive results to patients.
Senator Richard Gordon, PRC chairman and CEO, stressed that positive cases should be immediately informed of their status because if they are belatedly informed, they spread the virus in their community.
“Based on the calls, emails and text messages we receive requesting for their test results, at least one-third of over 15,700 positive confirmed cases since July 30 have not been informed yet about their status as confirmed positives and they may have been dangerously increasing community transmission,” Gordon said.
“Given the urgency of the situation of more positive confirmed cases in our country each day, PRC finds it imperative that the positive results should be immediately relayed to the patients as soon as results are available in our system. In the interest of preventing the disease from spreading which has been a severe problem, we would like to request the DOH to authorize and deputize the PRC in writing to release results to positive patients through our team of volunteer doctors, certified and trained non-doctor professionals, including social workers and volunteers. We believe that by working hand in hand it will allow us to prevent and control further community transmission,” he said in a letter to the DOH.
While the PRC sends negative results directly to those who undergo COVID testing at its molecular laboratories, positive results are sent to the DOH for individual release to the patients since these situations may produce perilous consequences and the DOH is in a better position and is better equipped to enforce government mandated health and safety protocols, which are embodied in the law and its implementing rules and regulations.
Reports show that acts of desperation of patients who tested positive for COVID-19 is rising at an alarming rate, with some resorting to suicide, evading quarantine an isolation protocols, or simply keeping the result from public knowledge, if not destroying it, to avoid the stigma attached to the disease.
