CITY OF SAN FERNANDO — Hundreds of patients afflicted with measles and presently confined in government hospitals in Pampanga will be transferred to an isolation building in nearby Mexico town to prevent the highly-contagious disease from spreading.
The number of measles cases had already climb to 190 with four deaths for the month of February alone.
“We have an unoccupied evacuation center in Mexico to be used as an isolation building for measles cases. The objective is to contain and prevent the carriers from spreading the highly-contagious disease,” said Provincial Health Office Doctor Marcelo Jauchico.
Jauchico said physicians, medical specialists and pediatricians would be deployed to the Mexico isolation building to attend to the medical needs of patients, mostly children from different towns and cities in the province.
The City of San Fernando and Angeles City have the most number of patients recorded with 24 cases; followed by Mabalacat City-17 cases. Porac -22 cases; Arayat-17 cases; Floridablanca-16-cases and the rest has minimal numbers of patients.
Governor Lilia Pineda earlier met chiefs of government hospitals where they discussed strategies to prevent mortality brought by measles outbreak, said Jauchico.
He added that the decision to isolate measles victims came after physicians reported that the ward of Jose B. Lingad Memorial Hospital have been “flooded” by patients and could no longer accommodate walk-in victims of the contagious disease.
“Jose B Lingad (JBL ) provincial hospital’s isolation wards are already congested and this is the reason kung bakit nagkakahawa-hawaan na ang mga pasyente,” Jauchico told reporters.
The outbreak, Jauchico said, had been noted by health authorities as early as October last year.
The Department of Health (DoH) directed hospital chiefs in Pampanga to start distributing vitamin A pills or tablets in order to improve their immunity from any illnesses.
“Ang vitamin A ang magpapalakas ng immune system ng tao para hindi kaagad kapitan ng sakit at maiwasan ang complications.” Jauchico explained.
Last year, a total of 137 measles cases have been recorded with 14 deaths across the province. -Jess Malabanan