THE Davao City Government is adding five more Temporary Treatment and Monitoring Facilities (TTMFs) for coronavirus diseases (Covid-19) patients as the Southern Philippines Medical Center (SPMC) reaches its full capacity and Covid-19 cases continue to increase.
Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio said additional treatment facilities are needed to decongest or unload SPMC.
She added that the City Health Office (CHO) has already arranged that all asymptomatic patients who do not need hospital care should not be taken to the hospital.
"Daghan mga asymptomatic nga wala gyud silay gibati, so ang buhaton is dili na sila ipadala didto sa SPMC. Kuhaon sila nato and i-process sila sa City Health Office, and then i-assign sila og TTMF (Many asymptomatic patients do not feel anything, so they wouldn't be brought to SPMC anymore. We will take them and the City Health Office will process and assign them to a TTMF)," she said.
She added that only Covid-19 positive patients who need hospital care will be taken to the hospital. These are patients who are severe or in critical condition, and asymptomatic that belong to the vulnerable sector or with comorbidities.
Duterte-Carpio said that once the five additional TTMFs are operational, the city will have a total of 11 treatment facilities.
"Ang duha is a donated facility by a private sector, and then naay three na gikuha sa city government of Davao (Two of the additional facilities are donated by the private sector and the other three were acquired by the city government of Davao). We are trying to up these five immediately," she said.
She said the six existing facilities have a capacity of 379 beds. As of 6 a.m. of October 26, the existing facilities have 175 available beds.
Recently, the city was permitted to allow double-deck beds in some of the facilities, which means more patients can be catered once the set-up is done.
The city has also acquired 1,400 contact tracers from the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) to cope up with the increasing number of Covid-19 active cases in the city.
"Sa kadaghan sa atong cases, mag-increase pa na sya kay each tao can infect several others. Kung naa tay 837 active cases, thousands ang ginapangita nato nga possibly infected (The number will still increase since one person can infect several others. If we have 837 active cases, thousands are being traced that are possibly infected)," the mayor said.
As of October 25, according to the Department of Health-Davao, Davao City has a total of 837 active cases. The city has a total of 3,228 total cases, 2,251 total recoveries, and 140 total deaths. (CIO)