(From left to right) GCMC ancillary services director Dr. Alvin Peñafiel and president– CEO Dr. Hazel Peñafiel, Mayor Edwin “EdSa” Santiago and Vice Mayor Jimmy T. Lazatin cut the ceremonial ribbon opening the Molecular and Diagnostic Pathology Laboratory. CSF-CIO
CITY OF SAN FERNANDO — Mayor Edwin “EdSa” Santiago and Green City Medical Center officially opened on Thursday the city’s first coronavirus disease testing center.
Santiago was accompanied by Green City president-CEO Dr. Hazel Peñafiel in the inauguration and press conference for the Molecular and Diagnostic Pathology Laboratory which was granted license by the Department of Health to conduct Covid-19 testing.
Santiago said that the public-private collaboration is pursued for the timely diagnosis of Covid-19 by reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR).
“Through testing, binibigyan natin ng hitsura ang kalaban. Once we have identified those individuals, we can now isolate them, find their contacts and treat them. That‘s how we ‘box in’ the virus here in the city through ‘Test. Isolate. Find. Treat’,” Santiago said.
The mayor also underscored the importance of testing in the city’s transition to the new normal: “We all want to go back to business, back to classes, and to our normal lives. But, we cannot really safely go to the new normal unless we first facilitate testing.”
This was affirmed by Dr. Renely P. Tungol, officer-in-charge of the city health office and commander of the incident management, stressing that the city will not be doing mass testing but will be following the guidelines of DOH for expanded targeted testing.
As per DOH guidelines, priority testing is being done for critical or severe cases, mild cases but vulnerable, mild cases but not vulnerable, and for theasymptomatic but with close contact or with history of travel.
On June 15, San Fernando already started testing the first priority group of 158 frontliners subjected to nasal swab testing.
The specimens were delivered to the pathology laboratory of GCMC which released the results after two days. All 158 specimens tested negative.
For two weeks now, San Fernando has not recorded any new case of Covid-19 infections but the city is expecting the number to spike up especially with the availability of the testing kits and facility.
Meanwhile, Peñafiel expressed her gratitude to the local government unit and committed to embrace the challenges as ancillary of San Fernando in winning the battle against Covid-19.
“At the time of pandemic, when some hospitals close their doors and some doctors and frontliners won’t receive patients, Green City is resolute in its stand to make our medical services available to the public, even to the most severe cases of Covid-19 infection,” she said.
