Red Cross marks 1st anniversary launch of molecular labs for Covid-19 testing
IT was on this day last year when the Philippine Red Cross (PRC), the country’s premier humanitarian organization, officially opened its first molecular laboratory to test for Covid-19 in its headquarters located in Mandaluyong City.
The Philippines was still in the initial phase of fighting against the invisible enemy during this time.
Prior to PRC’S intervention, the national government had to send swab samples abroad due to lack of local Covid-19 testing facilities.
Back then, the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM) was the facility capable of testing swab samples to detect Covid-19. RITM can process 300 samples per day. Results of the tests can be received after a week.
On April 14, 2020, the RITM accredited the private humanitarian group’s laboratory to conduct Covid-19 RT-PCR testing.
From 300 patients being tested daily, PRC has helped test additional 4,000 patients per day and deliver test results within 24 to 48 hours.
The initial operations of the PRC molecular laboratories came at a time when the country was deluged with overseas Filipino workers (OFWS) who were arriving in thousands daily because of the pandemic.the national government turned to PRC to test our countrymen who have been retrenched from their jobs abroad or who opted to be with their families in the uncertain times of the global outbreak. PRC was the first to collect the swabs of the OFWS by going to different hotels converted as quarantine facilities for OFWS. There were countless times when busloads of OFWS would come unexpectedly to PRC, without any advance notice for our swabbers to prepare, still the PRC accepted them and did its best to provide the test with utmost care and compassion for our OFWS.
Amid the increasing local transmission in communities which rooted from the lack of testing facilities and meager testing output of local laboratories, the national government, through the Department of Health (DOH) and the
Inter-agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF), and several local government units (LGUS), through the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA), came to PRC. At that time, the PRC has already tested more than 15,000 samples from various government hospitals.
The PRC has also been conducting RT-PCR tests for healthcare workers, ensuring the safety of the country’s frontline heroes who are exposed to Covid-positive patients daily. The PRC continues this endeavor even up to this day.
Today, PRC has 13 Covid-19 testing facilities strategically located around Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao. Soon, PRC will open its 14th Molecular Laboratory in Cotabato.
It can test as many as 46,000 individuals daily which will further increase by 12,000 tests following the acquisition of PRC of new RT-PCR machines, effectively boosting the national Covid-19 testing capacity.
The group has contributed 24 percent of the national test output and 34 percent of the tests of Metro Manila—the epicenter of Covid-19 in the Philippines—conducting over 2.5 million tests. That means 1 out of 4 Filipinos was tested by the PRC.
Indeed, the country could have had less than 2 million tests as of
today without the PRC. We can only imagine what would have happened if the PRC did not test.
But what drove the PRC to take on this huge challenge of building molecular laboratories with Biosafety Level 2 capacity?
“To save lives,” PRC Chairman and Sen. Richard J. Gordon says.
Witnessing that the Covid-19 death toll began to rise during the onset of the pandemic, Gordon looked at the attempts of other countries to curb the spread of the virus.
He was determined that testing was the “key” to drain the swamp.
The idea was to fight the deadly enemy, by testing and identifying those infected in the quickest possible time and covering as many people as possible and isolate those who tested positive.
This appeared to be a gigantic humanitarian task, but everyone went into overdrive.
Not known to many, the PRC has already capacitated itself to respond to a pandemic since 2019.
Chairman Gordon foresaw the need to prepare, knowing about the deadliest pandemic of 1918-1920 which took the lives of more than 100 million people.
He made sure that PRC was prepared should history repeat itself.
All his plans and goals, however, will never be fulfilled without the men of the women of the Red Cross who were in the frontlines regardless of the risks involved, and who, inspite of terminal exhaustion,
continued to work hard to save the lives of people they did not even know.
The establishment and operationalization of PRC’S molecular laboratories was, and remains to be, hard work.
It is the product of the combined efforts of Chairman Gordon, Board of Governors, management, staff and volunteers who selflessly and tirelessly worked 24/7 to support the government win the battle against Covid-19.
But in spite of this accomplishment, PRC continues to work to provide a more accessible Covid-19 testing.
This year, PRC officially launched saliva RT-PCR test, providing the public with a cheaper and non-invasive option for Covid-19 testing.
The group also leads in distribution of face masks, protective gears and cadaver bags, provision of negative pressure ambulance services, cash assistance, food packs, hot meals, tents, hygiene kits, water, handwashing facilities and psychosocial support.it is currently involved in the establishment of isolation facilities in coordination with LGUS and schools.
PRC molecular laboratories represent PRC’S staff and volunteers’ unwavering commitment to its mission, that is to alleviate the suffering and uplift the dignity of the most vulnerable, during the worst health crisis this century has ever seen.