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Monday, April 28, 2003
Alcala folks discriminated
By Fred P. Macaraeg
RESIDENTS of Alcala have been experiencing discrimination from people in other places in Pangasinan due to the quarantine.
This has been ongoing even as Provincial Health Officer Nemesia Mejia confirmed that the quarantine of three blocks of Vacante village in Alcala would be lifted by noon Sunday.
Dr. Meija confirmed this in an interview Sunday morning, saying health officials from the National Epidemiological Center would be arriving in Vacante to undertake final physical check up of the residents in the area.
"After the check up, they would disinfect all the houses in Puroks I, II and III," she said.
But four houses will remain under isolation. "It is the stand of the Department of Health (DOH) that the quarantine on the occupants of the four houses remain up to April 30, since they could have had direct contact from Adela and Mauricio Catalon," Mejia said.
If the occupants show no symptoms up to April 30, DOH will also lift the quarantine imposed upon them by May 1.
She disclosed that the medical team deployed in the area to monitor the health of the residents would be recalled by 1 p.m. Sunday.
Mejia, however, pointed out that the people in the three puroks would still be under observation for one month. "This is to let them feel that we have not left them altogether after the quarantine has been lifted," she said.
The residents would already go to the Rural Health Unit office at the town proper for check up, especially they feel sick or having fever, she said.
The PHO chief further said DOH Regional Director Dr. Eduardo Janairo would continue supplying them with vitamins.
Fifth district Board Member Dionisio "Saffe" Villar was irked last Friday when his constituents from Alcala were shoved out from two banks in Carmen, Rosales and in Urdaneta City when they tried to withdraw from their savings accounts.
Villar called on bank personnel not to treat these people like animals. "They should be given sympathy instead," he said.
The personnel of the Land Bank of the Philippines (LBP) purportedly told the Alcala people to withdraw in other banks.
He also lamented that when the folks went to a fastfood establishment in Urdaneta, they were not allowed to enter when the restaurant management learned that they came from Alcala.
A report was received indicating that personnel of the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) branch in Dagupan City would not allow people from Alcala to enter the building.
Alcala Mayor Juanito Collado also expressed lamentation regarding the treatment his town mates were receiving, which would let the municipality suffer economically.
"It will be hard for us to rise economically up in this kind of situation," Collado said.
Another report disclosed that a group of excursionists were not allowed to enter the Enchanted Kingdom in Laguna province upon learning that they came from Pangasinan.
Mejia said DOH would also declare the Villasis Polymedic Trauma Hospital free from the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (Sars) as "there is no local transmission of the viral disease."
She expressed gratitude that even if they did not open the hospital when the medical staff members, who attended to Adela Catalon, were put under isolation, they would be giving the salary of their employees.
She called on the people not to panic, saying that when one is panicky, he would be secreting hormones that would lower body resistance and would be susceptible to any disease.
Mejia said some people have been purportedly circulating leaflets that the hospital is contaminated with Sars and that the people passing by the hospital cover their noses and mouth.
The PHO chief also disclosed that the DOH would pursue its plan of making the annex building of the Region I Medical Center in Bonuan Binloc in Dagupan City an isolation area for suspected Sars victim.
"Rehabilitation of the building is already ongoing," she said.
Mejia said the building would be for isolating patients suspected to have contaminated the Sars virus.
"That would be for the easy observance of the patients and to contain the disease to avoid the spread of the virus," she pointed out.
The DOH was set to release five of the seven immediate members of the family last Sunday the from San Lazaro Hospital in Manila.
(April 28, 2003 issue)
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