Talisay City after residents with ILIs as COVID-19 cases continue to increase

Talisay City health personnel continue the conduct of contact tracing to identify individuals who may be infected with the virus. | Photo courtesy of Samsam Gullas

CEBU CITY, Philippines — The Talisay City government has already started with its barangay visits to identify individuals with Influenza-like illnesses (ILI).

Massive tracing is expected to prevent a community transmission of the infection especially in thickly populated communities, said Mayor Gerald Anthony Gullas.

As of Monday, Talisay City already recorded 26 cases of the infection with six deaths.

Gullas said that the increasing number of COVID-19 patients in his city is a cause for concern.  He said it is important to intensify their contact tracing so they could immediately isolated patients showing ILI symptoms and give them the needed medical attention.

He cited the case of Sitio Magay in Barangay Tangke that logged seven cases of the infection on Saturday.

Read: Following discovery of 7 COVID cases: Gullas orders lockdown in Sitio Magay, Brgy Tangke

In Barangay Cansojong, two individuals who manifested ILI symptoms which include cough, fever, colds, were also successfully swabbed and isolated prior to the release of their laboratory results which showed that they were positive of the virus.

Gullas said he wanted more individuals with ILIs immediately isolated.

“Ang importante lang gyod ani atong maisolate pending their results and that is what happened sa atong mga results nga ninggawas sa weekend nga ubay-ubay pa gyod,” said the mayor.

(It is important that we are able to immediately isolate these individuals pending the release of their lab results and the results that we got during the weekend showed that we logged several cases of the infection.)

Gullas said that it should not come as a surprise for city residents if they will continue to log additional COVID-19 cases in the coming days as a result of their ongoing contact tracing. / dcb