With COVID-19 patients being turned away, Robredo urges check on hospital bed shortage

MANILA, Philippines — Vice President Leni Robredo renewed her call to the Department of Health and the government’s coronavirus task force to look into the shortage of hospital beds for COVID-19 patients.

In a Facebook post on Wednesday night, Robredo said he saw new coverage of the recently held House of Representative hearings, where the DOH maintained that hospitals are not fully yet and that “93% of COVID patients have mild symptoms and do not need hospitalization.”

DOH data from case bulletin on Wednesday showed that in Metro Manila, 79% of ICU beds are utilized, 69% for isolation beds and 61% for ward beds. Health authorities reported 6,128 new COVID-19 cases, pushing national caseload to 747,288.

Active cases were at a record high on Wednesday at 130,245 but the case bulletin noted almost 98.4% are mild and asymptomatic.

Distress calls despite data

But the vice president said the accounts of families seeking hospitals for their sick loved ones is different from DOH data. She added that they have been receiving distress calls from families of COVID-19 patients who cannot be admitted to hospitals in the past week.

“We have read how many have already died inside tents outside hospitals, waiting to be admitted to the ERs, in ambulances while in transit, at home without receiving any medical help,” Robredo said.

FROM INTERAKSYON: Overwhelmed hospitals: Tragic stories of people who died of COVID-19 in the cold as told by relatives

She recalled that she has recommended in the past to expand hospital capacity by “setting up field hospitals, hiring more health care workers and paying them well, making sure hospitals are equipped with everything necessary to treat patients.”

The One Hospital Command Center, the healthcare referral network for suspected COVID-19 cases with hospitals, medical facilities and quarantine facilities, has a hotline for urgent cases but is sometimes unreachable, Health Undersecretary Leopoldo Vega also said at the House inquiry.

The center does not have a call forwarding feature that would have enabled its small pool of 30 agents to simultaneously cater to calls that have exponentially grown from just 70 calls a day to 388 calls per day.

Robredo said people who are coming to them also said they cannot contact the hotline.

“It must be because the system is overloaded. Was the infrastructure of this even fixed? There are many now offering Home Care Medical Package. But how about those who cannot pay? And even if they have, are there DOH standards that should be complied with by Home Care Specialists to ensure the well-being of those sick?” the vice president said in Filipino

“I am asking for patience (from authorities) if we are being persistent about this. People are getting sick and are dying. Please hasten addressing this because this is too urgent when lives of people are at stake,” she added. — Kristine Joy Patag with reports from Xave Gregorio