A view inside the first Bayanihan Cebu Field Center in Cebu that will begin operation on April 22. | Photo courtesy of OPAV
CEBU CITY, Philippines — Due to the continuous decline of new coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) cases in Cebu, a quarantine center here has suspended its operations.
The Office of the Presidential Assistant for the Visayas (OPAV), in a press statement issued on October 11, has confirmed that the Bayanihan Cebu Sacred Heart School Field Center has temporarily shut its doors since the start of October.
“The Bayanihan Cebu Sacred Heart School Field Center, which operates as an infirmary treating mild COVID-19 cases, has suspended operations as of October 1,” portions of the statement read.
The facility was built between March and April and started accepting COVID-19 patients in the first week of May.
In a separate advisory, the Bayanihan Cebu group, which runs and manages all Bayanihan Cebu quarantine centers here, said they would be referring future COVID-19 patients to their other quarantine center.
The other Bayanihan Center, with a bed capacity of 130, is found at the International Eucharistic Congress (IEC) Convention Center along Pope John Paul II Avenue, also in Cebu City.
Local and national government agencies here opened up several isolation centers, including the Bayanihan Cebu Sacred Heart School Field Center in General Maxilom Avenue in Cebu City, in a bid to address the increasing number of new COVID-19 patients in Cebu before.
READ MORE: COVID-19 field center in Cebu to ‘activate’ on April 22
However, OPAV said the Bayanihan Cebu Sacred Heart School Field Center might be reactivated in case the island-province might experience another wave of new COVID-19 cases.
“Bayanihan Cebu, however, explained that they would reactivate the SHS facility if the need would arise and there would be an increase in the number of COVID-19 patients that had to be quarantined,” said OPAV.
In the meantime, Secretary Michael Lloyd Dino, OPAV chief, welcomed this development, saying it ‘marked improvement in Cebu’s anti-COVID-19 campaign’.
Dino also commended the business sector, the medical frontliners, the Philippine National Police, and the Armed Forces of the Philippines for their valuable contribution in addressing the COVID-19 crisis in Cebu./dbs