Mobile tents eyed for isolation, ICU beds with more hospitals at full capacity
MANILA, Philippines — Mobile tents as isolation or ICU facilities will be built with more hospitals reaching full capacity for COVID-19 patients, presidential spokesperson Harry Roque said Monday.
Speaking to ANC's "Headstart," he said officials have identified an area owned by a government-owned and controlled corporation for the tents that provide up to 200 additional beds.
"We're doing what other countries did at the height of their own pandemic and relying on mobile hospitals," Roque said, more than a year since the health crisis began at home.
Data by the Department of Health as of April 3 showed a 66.8% bed occupancy rate in Metro Manila, or 6,162 occupied out of the 9,223 in total. Occupied ICU beds are at 636, or 78.42%, isolation beds at 3,238 or 70.19%, and ward beds at 2,288 or 60.23%.
As the country battles a surge in infections, many Filipinos took to social media to grieve the loss of their loved ones from COVID-19. Some also allayed concerns that getting admission to hospitals have grown difficult.
Apart from mobile tents, Roque said government has put up an additional critical care facility for 110 ICU beds at the Quezon Institute in Quezon City. In Caloocan, he said too that 160 more beds were added at the Dr. Jose N. Rodriguez Memorial Hospital.
In seeking to defend the administration from mounting criticism on its pandemic handling, Roque said the Philippines is "not alone in this predicament," with other countries also facing the same.
He that even the DOH could not have expected how infectious the new COVID-19 variants would be.
"I don't know if they could have foreseen the spread of these new variants are," he said, "and as a result, we had these ballooning numbers."
The Duterte government has long been criticized for its seemingly militaristic response to the COVID-19. With the situation at home worse compared to 2020, even lawmakers have called for an overhaul in its strategy, including on the people it has put in charge.
On April 5, the Philippines' overall COVID-19 tally breached the 800,000th mark, with 8,355 new cases. The OCTA Research group said the total is likely to reach a million by end of the month.
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