THE Pangasinan Provincial Health Office (PHO) confirmed on Thursday, March 26, that 17 out of the 37 patients under monitoring (PUIs) in the province have tested negative for the coronavirus disease (Covid-19).

In an interview, PHO chief Dr. Anna Ma. Teresa de Guzman said the 17 PUIs have already been discharged from hospitals as they no longer show symptoms and have finished the 14-day quarantine.

De Guzman said seven other PUIs have also been discharged from the hospital upon completion of their quarantine without any symptoms of the virus.

She added that only 12 PUIs remain in the hospitals, but one PUI died on Wednesday while waiting for the test result for Covid-19.

“The PUI is a 59-year-old engineer working as the head of a department in the Municipal Government here and who lives in Lingayen town. The patient was admitted on March 24 at the Region 1 Medical Center. They were able to perform throat swab for the testing for Covid-19, but the patient died on March 25, 7:05 p.m.,” de Guzman said.

Authorities are conducting contact tracing as part of their protocol.

“We started contact tracing because once a person is declared PUI, we immediately trace direct contacts so in case the result comes out positive, we already know who will be advised to self-quarantine,” she added.

Meanwhile, De Guzman said the Provincial Government is preparing an extension of the isolation building in Sta. Barbara town for PUIs already recovered but awaiting the result of their tests.

“This is not operational yet but just in case we’ll have more PUIs, the extension will be for the PUIs no longer showing symptoms and almost done with their quarantine period but waiting for test results,” she said.

De Guzman added the extension area is not for the new PUIs as they need more hospital services such as dextrose, ventilators, and specialists.

As of Thursday, Pangasinan has 69,685 persons under monitoring and four positive cases for Covid-19, two of them died while two others are admitted at the hospital. (PNA)