Time to get serious in fighting Covid-19
AS of
Sunday,
March
29, 12 doctors in the country have died after being infected by their coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid19)-patients.
One of the doctors, Sally Gatchalian, assistant director of the government’s Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM), was hale and hearty when she returned from Los Angeles, California, in January.
RITM is the main testing center for Covid-19 in the Philippines.
Her relatives in the LA are devastated over her death.
Gatchalian spent her vacation with former actress Krista Ranillo and husband Niño Jefferson Lim, a Filipino-American, in Los Angeles before flying back to Manila.
Lim owns Island Pacific, a chain of supermarkets in the United States selling Filipino food products.
“Everyone in my household was shocked upon hearing of (Aunt) Sally’s death,” Lim told me over the phone.
Gatchalian, a pediatrician, was president of the Philippine Pediatric Society.
The men and women of the hour are the doctors, nurses and other medical personnel — collectively referred to as health care workers (HCWs) — who risk and sacrifice their lives for thousands of Covid-19 patients.
These HCWs are the frontliners in combating the deadly coronavirus.
Many of them have been infected and 12 doctors — as I mentioned above — have given the supreme sacrifice attending to Covid-19 patients.
The HCWs have their hands full answering the need of the hour.
One doctor, Celia Carlos, RITM director, was relieved of her position by her superiors after she allegedly could not accommodate politicians, top government officials and their staff who wanted to be given priority in the test for Covid-19.
HCWs at the Makati Medical Center complained that Sen. Aquilino Martin “Koko” Pimentel 3rd threw his weight around when he was asked to leave the hospital because he and his pregnant wife had been tested positive for Covid-19.
The Makati Medical Center has since accepted Pimentel’s apology after Secretary
Francisco Duque 3rd called the hospital.
The mortality rate of 6 percent of the number of Covid-19 patients means that the country’s health care facilities are already overwhelmed and the actual cases are much higher than what the current number shows.
This is the gist of a dissertation of Jose Xavier Gonzales, chairman of the board of The Medical City (TMC) Hospital, on the spread of Covid-19 in the country.
The expected mortality rate of Covid-19 worldwide is 3.8 to 4 percent.
Hard-hit Italy, with 8,000 deaths out of 80,589 infected people so far, has a mortality rate of 10 percent.
In the Philippines, there have been 45 deaths out of 707 afflicted or 6.36 percent.
“The time for pretending that we are in control is over,” Gonzales said.
Gonzales said the government and the private sector must do five things to contain the novel coronavirus:
1. Accelerate the approval of test kits, especially the locally designed ones, to start the mass production of the kits.
The ball is now in the court of the Department of Health, which has supervision over the Food and Drug Administration.
2. Expand the number of level 3 hospital laboratories from the current 10 Covid-19 hospitals to process the test kits.
Of the 1,436 hospitals in the country, 10 percent or 140 are Level 3, which are medical centers and teaching hospitals and are the most sophisticated.
“We can emulate the South Korean model, which has proven to be very effective, and harness the laboratory power of these hospitals to ramp up testing,” said the TMC head.
3. Activate local government unit- and community-run hospitals for the mildly and strongly symptomatic Covid-19 patients.
TMC President Dr. Gene Ramos met with Pasig Mayor Victor Maria Regis “Vico” Sotto on March 20 to discuss plans to convert the city’s 100-bed Child’s Hope Hospital for Covid-19 use, Gonzales said.
“The Ultra Sports Complex, gymnasiums, churches and schools can be temporarily converted into quarantine places for persons under monitoring and persons under investigation,” he added.
4. Engage a larger set of HCWs in patient care ratio of one HCW is to 2 to 4 patients.
Right now, hospital nurse to patient ratio is one is to 25 to 30 patients.
“There are 500,000 registered nurses in the Philippines, but only 200,000 are active [or employed in different hospitals],” Gonzales said.
The Professional Regulations Commission may want to consider relaxing the three-year relicensing provision for doctors and nurses so that the country can pull in HCWs who have returned to retire in the country or get back those left for the business process outsourcing industry, commonly known as call centers.
5. Build a minimum P2-billion stockpile of personal protection equipment [such as face masks], ventilators and beds for intensive care units (ICUs).
“We will also need portable negative pressure tents with at least 10 ICU beds, which can be deployed where pockets of infection arise. Each tent should have portable ventilators and oxygen tanks,” said Gonzales.
More Good Samaritans are coming out in the unprecedented crisis. Thank you all.
Businessman Archibald “Archie” Po has offered his Lionair planes and Safeair Corp. fuel distributor to deliver, free of charge, medical supplies and test kits to any part of the country with an airport.
The service would be on a 24/7 basis, Po said.
Lionair pilots, co-pilots and aircraft mechanics have also volunteered their services for free.
“This is part of our contribution to the efforts of the national government in fighting Covid-19,” Po said.
Archie! May others follow your example.