Phl still MERS free as nurse tests negative

MANILA, Philippines - The Filipina nurse initially reported to have been diagnosed with the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome-Corona Virus (MERS-CoV) by Saudi Arabia tested negative for the virus in confirmatory tests, the Department of Health (DOH) said yesterday.

This bolstered the DOH’s pronouncement that the Philippines remains free from MERS-CoV.

Globally, 837 laboratory-confirmed cases, including 291 deaths, were reported to the World Health Organization as of July 23.

DOH spokesman Lyndon Lee Suy noted that the throat swab samples taken from the 37-year-old nurse, identified as “AP,” were examined by the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM) and were found negative for the virus.

The nurse was discharged from the Southern Philippines Medical Center in Davao City yesterday.

The DOH found out last Thursday that AP was originally negative in the Saudi tests. It opted to wait for the results of the confirmatory tests performed by the RITM to “avoid confusion.”

A native of General Santos City, AP arrived in the Philippines last Aug. 29, four days after she was tested for the virus in Dammam, Saudi Arabia where she was working as hospital nurse.

AP did not wait for the test results before flying home.

Last Sept. 2, she was notified by her nurse supervisor in Saudi Arabia that she tested positive for the virus.

The nurse, in turn, notified the DOH about her condition. The department brought AP to the Davao City hospital for testing and isolation.

AP’s co-nurse, identified as “CB,” who returned to the Philippines with her, was negative for the virus.

But since AP stayed for one night in CB’s house in San Jose del Monte, Bulacan before taking a Cebu Pacific flight to General Santos City last Aug. 31, the latter and her family members were also tested for the virus by the DOH.

The tests yielded negative results.

Contact tracing terminated

Lee Suy said that since AP was negative, the contact tracing of the two nurses’ co-passengers in the two flights had been suspended.

“What’s good about this is that when there’s a negative case, there’s no way for the infection to be transmitted because there is no source,” he said.

What went wrong?

Lee Suy, however, refused to blame anyone regarding the confusion on AP’s health status.

“There was (an issue) on communication. We don’t want to dwell on that anymore. We don’t want to implicate people. What’s good about it is that people are reporting possible cases. That’s more of a pro-active thing,” he said.

He said the DOH just acted as part of its “rumor surveillance” procedures after they were informed about AP’s Saudi results.

“There’s no way to prevent rumor surveillance. Everything starts with a rumor. What if it turned out to be true? We don’t consider it a mistake, it’s part of investigation,” he said.

Buried immediately

Meanwhile, the remains of the nurse who succumbed to MERS-CoV at the King Fahd Medical City in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia last May 6 arrived in Bacolod City Thursday and was buried immediately by her family and friends at the Rolling Hills Memorial Park.

Ma. Gemma Barilea-Oplas, 45, of Cadiz City, Negros Occidental had been working in Saudi Arabia since 2001 and at the King Fahd Medical City as an emergency room nurse since 2005, according to her husband Bonifacio Oplas.

His wife got infected by her fellow nurse who was confined at their hospital.  – With Edith Regalado, Danny Dangcalan