Baguio logs 2,199 diarrhea cases
BAGUIO CITY — Patients distraught with acute gastroenteritis rose to 2,199 as of 11 a.m. Thursday, the Baguio City Health Services Office (CHSO) said, citing its self-reporting system.
To allay the public's fears, Baguio City Mayor Benjamin Magalong said that they expect the cases to crawl down soon with the safety and preventive measures adopted by the food establishments and households in the city.
Magalong said that as of 10 p.m. on Wednesday, 45 patients were admitted at the hospital. There were no severe infections reported.
He assured the public that in view of this, testing of water samples from suspected sources also continues to be fast-tracked.
He said that total of water samples submitted was 28. Sixteen of which had results while 12 others are awaiting results. All the 16 tested negative for thermotolerant coliform organism and will be subjected to viral testing at the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM).
Baguio City Health Officer physician Celia Flor Brillantes claimed that based on the reports received, that majority of the cases occurred from January 2 to 8.
Of the total number of cases, 492 sought consultation in health facilities with 64.4% still symptomatic.
Majority or 63.6% of the patients dined in a food establishment; 13.2% ordered take-out food; 11.2% ate home-cooked meals and 12% had other circumstances.
The CHSO detailed that a total of 218 cases were from outside Baguio while 204 were from neighboring towns. One hundred thirtreen cases are from Barangay Bakakeng Norte, 100 from unspecified locations, 94 from Irisan, 90 from Camp 7 and the rest were logged from the different barangays in the city.
