PRC testing centers

Carrying out its mission of alleviating human suffering, the Philippine Red Cross stepped up its campaign to help prevent the spread in the country of the coronavirus disease 2019 or COVID-19, which is crippling the whole world, by opening up two state-of-the-art testing centers, for starters.

Senator Richard Gordon, PRC chairman and CEO, said that from Day 1 of the campaign to prevent the spread of the disease, he and medical experts and his staff already discussed the need for testing.

“That should really be able to allow us to isolate and make sure that the patients can be healed and make sure that they can recover faster. The focus is we cannot beat this unless we unmask the invisible enemy and we can only do that by testing. And you can separate them, isolate them and you start healing people. The focus must be victory against the virus,” he stressed.

Gordon said two molecular laboratories or testing centers, which are both equipped with four machines each that are capable of running up to 1,000 tests each machine, are now up and running. He added that after opening the first testing center, located at the mezzanine of the PRC’s national headquarters along EDSA, cor. Boni Ave., PRC personnel finished testing some 1,000 samples from the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine in a short time.

“Each machine is capable of running up to 1,200 tests, theoretically, but I’ll be happy with 800 or 500 in the beginning and when they become more proficient, dapat makakuha tayo ng at least 1,000 each machine per day. I’m happy na pinadalhan tayo ng RITM (Research Institute for Tropical Medicine) ng 1,000 samples. We were able to finish them right away,” he said.

The second testing center was opened last week at PRC’s Logistics Center, located behind its national headquarters. A third one is about to be opened at PRC’s old national headquarters in Port Area, Manila, which would also be equipped with four testing machines.

Gordon also said that aside from that, four other testing centers are already under construction in Subic, Clark, Batangas and UP Los Baños. He added that more testing centers will be opened in the North, the Visayas and Mindanao.

“Then we’ll go to the Visayas and the Northern areas. We’ll start with Cebu first and we’ll start with Zamboanga in Mindanao then we’ll go to Cagayan De Oro, GenSan and Surigao. And then in the Visayas, we’ll have Negros Island, Panay Island and Leyte and Samar,” the PRC chairman disclosed.

To ensure that the most vulnerable in the hardest hit, especially in Metro Manila, will be able to avail of the test, the PRC entered into memoranda of agreement with various local governments in the National Capital Region which will shoulder the testing costs for their constituents.

Swabbing will be conducted in the barangays by LGU personnel trained by the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM). Then the test kits will be transported to the Molecular Laboratory in Mandaluyong. There the samples will be placed inside the testing machine together with the automated RNA extractor and then the PCR MA 6000 will determine whether the sample is negative or positive.

The public can also avail of the testing by appointment to ensure that social distancing will be strictly complied with at the testing center. They can call 1158, the PRC’s COVID hotline, where trained PRC staff and volunteers, which include doctors, will interview them and schedule them for testing if needed or refer them to appropriate hospitals.

For sharing with the government the “ultimate weapon,” as Interior and Local Government Secretary Eduardo Año said which would ensure victory over the virus, the Philippine Red Cross truly deserved all the praises and accolade it received from various officials, including no less than Health Secretary Francisco Duque III, who heads the Inter-Agency Task Force on Emerging Infectious Diseases.

Duque, who considered the testing centers a lifeline, thanked Gordon for the gargantuan undertaking. “I would consider that it’s indeed a lifeline. A lifeline to the government’s almost desperate effort to really raise our testing capacity, cognizant of the fact that testing remains to be a corner stone in the national governments effort to respond to the pandemic COVID-19,” he said.

And Gordon, who is not one for grabbing all the credits to himself, shared the credits to the PRC’s staff and volunteers, who, he said, do not let the enhanced community quarantine, which had now been extended to May 15, stop them from working and providing humanitarian assistance.

The good senator also mentioned the donors whose generosity enabled the Philippine Red Cross to build the said facilities and the others that would also be opened.

He also gave special thanks to Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. and Philippine Ambassador to China Chito Sta. Romana for their assistance in getting the machines shipped here.

Personally, I take my hat off to Senator Gordon and the Philippine Red Cross!

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