The Philippine Red Cross (PRC) plans to offer COVID-19 saliva RT-PCR tests at major shopping malls.
“A few large malls have contacted the Philippine Red Cross now that the saliva RT-PCR is also available," Dr. Paulyn Ubial, head of PRC's Molecular Laboratory, said in an interview on radio dzBB.
Such a move would allow more people to get tested for COVID-19 because the saliva test costs only P2,000, which is cheaper than the swab test by 60 percent, she said.
Ubial said the saliva test may be conducted in the parking lots of shopping malls.
“It's like a drive-through. You're just inside the car, they will give you a sample kit, that's where you spit, and you're going to give it to the sample collector. You don't need to get out of the car," she said.
The saliva test is safer for the one conducting the test and also does not need a cold storage facility, she added.
Saliva test not yet covered by PhilHealth
State insurer Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) has yet to include saliva COVID-19 tests in its benefit package, the Philippine Red Cross said Sunday.
PhilHealth last week launched the cheaper and non-invasive saliva PCR test in its Metro Manila laboratories following approval from the Department of Health.
The DOH Health Technology Assessment Council, however, has yet to give the go-signal for public use, said PRC chairman Senator Richard Gordon.
“Secretary Duque told us we can test but for private use. The ordinary people, the OFWs, will be late to avail because their testing is shouldered by PhilHealth,” he told ABS-CBN's TeleRadyo.
“I'm getting angry because it's not right that they're slow. That's why I call a spade a spade,” he said.
The state insurer still owes PRC some P590 million for its coronavirus testing of returning Filipino migrant workers, Gordon said.
No new UK variant cases found
The Department of Health (DOH) on Saturday evening announced that no UK variant of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) was detected in the fourth batch of 48 samples that underwent sequencing.
“Due to the global shortage of sequencing reagents for high throughput whole genome sequencing, the Department of Health (DOH) reports that the Philippine Genome Center (PGC) was able to sequence only 48 samples for the fourth batch of sequencing, and none of which was positive for the B.1.1.7 variant,” said the DOH in a statement.
Of the 48 samples, 23 cases came from the National Capital Region which were mostly from Quezon City; 19 from CALABARZON with most cases from Laguna; four from the Cordillera Region; and two were returning overseas Filipinos.
The DOH also reported that seven of these cases are already tagged as recovered, while the rest are active and are either asymptomatic or mild cases.
2,103 new cases logged
The Philippines has logged on Sunday 2,103 new cases of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), bringing the total to 525,618, as 10 laboratories failed to submit their data on time, the Department of Health (DOH) reported.
This marks the second consecutive day with more than 2,000 new infections.
The DOH reported 80 new fatalities, bringing the death toll to 10,749 cases, which is 2.05 percent of the total.
The DOH also reported 11,653 new recoveries, in the DOH’s “mass recovery adjustment”, bringing the total recoveries to 487,551, which is 92.8 percent of the total.
34 cases found in House mass testing
Thirty-four of 2,848 people tested positive for COVID-19 in the House of Representatives' second mass testing effort, Secretary General Mark Llandro Mendoza said Sunday.
In a statement, Mendoza said the new cases are equivalent to a positivity rate of 1.19 percent, which is below the 5 percent positivity rate recorded during the first mass testing.
Almost all the new COVID-19 cases in the House were asymptomatic and have been isolated to avoid further transmission, he said. Immediate tracing of their close contacts was also conducted.
Baguio slates free tests
Baguio City has scheduled free COVID-19 testing from Feb. 1-3 at the Melvin Jones Grandstand.
City Health Officer Dr. Rowena Galpo said a total of 3,000 tests were made available to the city by the Bases Conversion and Development (BCDA) upon the request of Mayor Benjamin Magalong under the agency's Aggressive Community Testing (ACT) project.
This will be the first ACT activity in the city this year and the fourth since the pandemic broke out last year.
Target sectors are national government agency employees, uniformed personnel, private clinic and dialysis center staff, Burnham Park workers, eatery workers or food handlers, market vendors, porters, Barangay Health Emergency Response Team members, beauty parlor workers, security guards, bank employees, construction workers, contact tracers, drivers, health workers and city government employees.
Galpo said those in the target groups are encouraged to avail of the free tests.