Quezon City to do tracing, testing after transient tests positive for new COVID-19 variant
MANILA, Philippines — The Quezon City government said it will conduct contact tracing and testing in Barangay Commonwealth after learning that an individual infected with the more contagious coronavirus variant was staying in the area.
The city government said it was only told Wednesday that a 35-year-old man who tested positive for the more transmissible variant was staying in an apartment in the Riverside community with a companion.
“We are acting very quickly to isolate the two, and to conduct extensive contact tracing and testing in the area. It is now unfortunate that we learned about this only now,” Mayor Joy Belmonte said in a release Thursday.
The individual was among the additional cases of the B.1.1.7 variant reported by the Department of Health last week and was tagged as a resident of Liloan, Cebu.
The man and his companion will be transferred to the Hope Facility Thursday.
The Quezon City government said the man was a former overseas Filipino worker who returned to the Philippines in August 2020 and stayed in Cebu. In November, he moved to Sucat in Parañaque City.
He took a swab test on January 17 and on the next day, he tested positive for COVID-19 and his sample was sent to the Philippine Genome Center for sequencing. He was staying at a quarantine hotel in Manila until his manning agency transferred him to an apartment in Riverside.
The man’s genome sequencing results released February 5 showed he contracted the B.1.1.7 variant. On February 8, he developed a mild cough.
Manning agency
Belmonte said she is seeking legal advice on the liability of the manning agency for not complying with mandated health protocols.
“This agency placed an entire community at risk by bringing a COVID-19 positive patient to our city, considering that both their agency and the quarantine hotel are in Manila,” she said.
The mayor also asked the Bureau of Quarantine to determine why the hotel released the man to the agency several days after he tested positive.
Authorities have so far detected 25 cases of the variant that was first seen in the United Kingdom. — Gaea Katreena Cabico
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Disclosure: Quezon City Mayor Joy Belmonte is a shareholder of Philstar Global Corp., which operates digital news outlet Philstar.com. This article was produced following editorial guidelines.
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