THERE were 202 confirmed cases of Covid-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, as of 12 p.m. the other day. The good news is that seven of the patients have recovered and most probably been discharged from confinement. The bad news is that 17 others died. That’s about 8.5 percent of the Covid-19 population in the Philippines, higher than the average in other countries.
But don’t let the numbers alarm you. The reason for our comparatively higher Covid-19 death rate could be because the base is low as the number of persons infected by the virus is unintentionally underreported. I was told by a doctor friend thar not all infected people develop a bad cough or severe fever or have difficulty breathing. Many, he said, show only mild symptoms and heal without medical intervention. In other words being infected with the virus is not a death warrant.
Note that because of our very limited testing capacity, not everyone with a cough, fever or shortness of breath can avail themselves of laboratory testing immediately. We are advised to go on voluntary quarantine in that event unless our condition worsens since doing otherwise would unduly burden our hospitals and health care system.
The situation may change in the next days when the Vicente Sotto Memorial Medical Center starts operating its coronavirus testing capacity. In fact, an announcement from the World Health Organization (WHO) last Wednesday said that the VSMMC and four more laboratories in the country, were supposed to already begin screening samples for Covid-19 March 18, 2020.
The other subnational laboratories are those in the Baguio General Hospital and Medical Center in Baguio City, the Southern Philippines Medical Center in Davao City, the San Lazaro Hospital and the Lung Center of the Philippines both in Manila. Until recently, only the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM) was equipped to test samples for the virus.
Health Secretary Francisco Duque, who ironically is under monitoring himself because he had contact with the DOH director who was found positive for Covid-19, said the RITM has received additional supplies of test kits, boosting its daily testing capacity to 450 from only 300.
Duque also disclosed that the University of the Philippines National Institute of Health will soon make available the coronavirus detection kits that its scientists invented. Aside from this, “thousands of additional test kits” are arriving from China and South Korea. The only problem, he said, is that there are not enough trained technicians to operate them.
Still, we should not expect that all of us will be tested. The sad reality is that there are not enough testing kits to serve all of us. If it is any consolation, this problem is not peculiar to us. Even the United States is experiencing a similar, if not worse, shortage making people unhappy, if not angry.
When the Brooklyn Nets, for example, announced that four of their players including superstar Kevin Durant have been found by a private laboratory to be positive for the virus, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio criticized the team and other NBA players, who also had themselves tested, for getting preferential treatment because they were rich.
“(But) with all due respect, an entire NBA team should NOT be tested for Covid-19 while there are critically ill patients waiting to be tested,” de Blasio fumed. “Tests should not be for the wealthy, but for the sick.”
The National Basketball Players Association executive director Michele Roberts pushed back, laying the blame on the government instead. “I get it,” she said. “People should not be having to wait in line. But goddamn it, if the government had done what they were supposed to do, we wouldn’t be competing for an opportunity to be tested.”
Here at least, we are not quarreling.