Negros Oriental sees more coronavirus cases

ON June 4, both Bohol and Negros Oriental reported confirmed coronavirus disease 2019 ( Covid- 19) infections resulting from community transmission. An 89- year- old man from Calape died on May 26 not many hours after being admitted to the Bohol Provincial Hospital. In Tagbilaran City, Mayor John Geesnell Yap announced one case. The Negros Oriental provincial government reported a case in Dumaguete City. Unlike 15 other cases reported since May 31, this case is not imported.

Bohol has less than 10 confirmed cases while Negros Oriental has 20. By contrast, Cebu, the regional center of Central Visayas, has 3,400 confirmed infections — Cebu City accounts for close to 2,800 — the improved testing capacity making it possible to test beyond severely ill, hospitalized patients and their immediate family.

The first three confirmed Covid19 cases in the Philippines were Chinese tourists who traveled from Wuhan via Hong Kong and Cebu in January to visit Negros Oriental and Bohol. The first known Covid- 19 fatality outside China was a 44- yearold man who, together with his partner, visited Dumaguete City and Dauin on January 22 to 25 — incidentally at the same time that Wuhan was placed under lockdown. Upon arriving in Manila, the couple went to the hospital. The man’s death was reported by Health Secretary Francisco Duque 3rd on February 1.

As for Bohol, the infected tourist tested negative before she left the island and departed via Cebu on January 31.

Researchers from Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico in the United States suggest that the “version” of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 ( SARSCoV2) that started spreading in Europe in early February and has infected thousands of people in Europe, the Americas and Asia is a more aggressive mutant of the “original” virus that emerged from Wuhan. This could explain why the three infected Chinese tourists apparently didn’t infect other persons while touring the Philippines.

Eleven of the newly infected in Negros Oriental are fishermen from the fishing vessel

which arrived in Negros Oriental on May 17 from a twomonthlong fishing expedition off Palawan. Majority of the men hail from the province and were to disembark, but the vessel carried the body of one dead fisherman. Suspecting Covid-19 infection, the local government didn’t allow the crew to disembark. After four days of waiting, 168 ( 171, according to one report) fishermen were allowed to leave the 53- year- old vessel. On shore, they were subjected to swab tests before being brought to the provincial government’s isolation facility.

As of June 3, a total of 13 fishermen (two are from Cebu) have tested positive and 155 negative ( three results are pending, according to one local report). Aside from the fisherman whose body was retrieved from

in Negros, two others had died in hospitals in Manila, provincial health officials told local