Public Works and Highways Secretary Mark A. Villar said more healthcare facilities will be cobstructed in Bacolod City and other areas of the province.
Villar said the Task Force to Facilitate Augmentation of National and Local Health Facilities with Regional Office 6 is ramping up construction activities of healthcare facilities In response to the recent spike of local transmissions of COVID-19 in Bacolod City.
Undersecretary Emil K. Sadain, head of DPWH Task Force to Facilitate Augmentation of National and Local Health Facilities on September 9 met with National Task Force (NTF) Against Covid-19 and the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-EID) officials headed by Secretary and chief implementer of the government’s COVID-19 response Carlito Galvez Jr., Baguio City Mayor and chief tracing czar Benjamin Magalong, and Health Undersecretary and chief treatment czar Leopoldo Vega, in conducting situational assessment in Bacolod City and Negros Occidental mapping out coordinated operations to defeat COVID-19.
The IATF handles the policies on the country’s response to the pandemic with DPWH Secretary Villar as the appointed isolation czar.
Sadain said the government will construct 109-bed capacity health facilities in Bacolod City and 253-bed capacity health facilities in other parts of Negros Occidental during the meeting with Negros Occidental Governor Eugenio Jose Lacson, Bacolod City Mayor Evelio Leonardia and along with representatives from the business and medical sectors.
Galvez and Sadain had earlier signed a memorandum of agreeement with Mayor Evelio Leonardia for the facility administration by the city government once the on-going two sets of isolation facilities with total capacity of 32 beds at Brgy. Alijis, Bacolod City are completed by DPWH Region 6 headed by Director Leah Delfinado towards end of September to early October.
Sadain said that works are also currently on-going for the off-site dormitory with 32-bed capacity at Corazon Locsin Montelibano Memorial Regional Hospital, Bacolod City intended for accomodation of hospital workers.
We have to ramp up construction of quarantine/isolation facilities for COVID patients all over Negros Occidental and other provinces of Western Visayas in order to eliminate, if not mitigate, the spike of COVID cases, and at the same time speed up the completion of offsite dormitories inside hospitals compound for temporary shelters of medical frontline workers, said Sadain.
Additionally, 45 cubicles will be put up for asymptomatic COVID 19 patients of the existing Regional Evacuation Center at Brgy. Vista Alegre, Bacolod City.
Meanwhile, Galvez, a MOA was signed for the construction of seven other healthcare facilities in the municipality of Valladolid and in the cities of San Carlos, Kabankalan, Silay, Cadiz, La Carlota, Escalante City.
A quarantine facility is also being readied at the Regional Evacuation Center in Brgy. Rizal, San Carlos City with 45 beds and offsite dormitories in the following hospitals: Lorenzo Zayco District Hospital, Kabankalan City, 32 beds; Teresita L. Jalandoni Provincial Hospital, Silay City, 32 beds; Cadiz District Hospital, Cadiz City, 32 beds; Don Salvador Benedicto District Hospital, La Carlota City, 32 beds.
Other proposed projects include a 16-bed isolation facility in Kabankalan City and dormitories for medical workers of Valladolid and Escalante City, each with 32 beds.
For the six provinces of Region 6, there are a total of 34 healthcare facilities being constructed by DPWH with 1,079 bed capacities.