The Philippine General Hospital said Tuesday it is not "overwhelmed" by the increase in the number of COVID-19 patients being brought to the facility in the past few days.
"'Yung question n’yo na overwhelmed na ba 'yung PGH, hindi naman po," PGH spokesman Jonas del Rosario told Dobol B sa News TV.
"Kasi, although we offered 130 beds initially to the DOH [Department of Health], eventually we were able to really create 200 beds," Del Rosario said.
He said the highest number of admissions at the end of April at the PGH was 172 cases. The number then further went down to 75 to 80 admissions in May.
Duque asked to ‘step up’
Health Secretary Francisco Duque III should “step up” amid mounting fresh calls for him to resign over the supposed lapses in his leadership in addressing the coronavirus pandemic, the special adviser to the National Task Force on COVID-19 said on Tuesday.
“I think he needs to step up. He needs also to hear the voices of the people and perhaps reflect on some other plans or measures and perhaps [organize] a very brief three-day team building and come up with a business plan for the next three months,” Tony Leachon told ABS-CBN.
He also advised Duque to serve at the pleasure of Filipinos and not just at the pleasure of President Rodrigo Duterte.
Pay up, PhilHealth asked
A House leader on Tuesday urged the Philippine Health Insurance Corp. to settle at least P18 billion in the unpaid reimbursement claims of accredited hospitals throughout the country.
“This is very urgent because we are still facing this COVID-19 pandemic, and we all need the full operations of our hospitals with the necessary medical personnel,” Cagayan de Oro Rep. Rufus Rodriquez said.
“We don’t want our hospitals to close, down scale down services or lay off medical personnel because of the non-payment of claims by PhilHeath.”
More test positive
The Department of Foreign Affairs said Tuesday the number of Filipinos abroad who tested positive for the COVID-19 exceeded 6,000 following the reported 455 new infections.
The agency said of the 6,021 Filipinos abroad who were infected with COVID-19, 2,833 had recovered, but it recorded 16 more fatalities that brought the death toll to 442.
There were 2,746 patients undergoing treatment as of June 16.
