Manila: A Filipina nurse earlier suspect of having been infected with the deadly Mers-COV in Saudi Arabia tested negative for the disease in the Philippines.
In a televised press briefing on Friday, the Department of Health corrected reports and allayed fears that the dreaded Middle East Respiratory Syndrome-Corona Virus (Mers-COV) had reached the Philippines. Department of Health spokesman Dr Lyndon said the suspected carrier, a nurse, tested negative for the virus following a round of tests conducted on her by doctors at the Southern Philippines Medical Centre (SPMC) in Davao City where she was confined since September 2.
The 37-year-old nurse, whose identity is being safeguarded, was only referred to by doctors as “AP”. Reports said she was allowed to return to her home in South Cotabato.
Tests were conducted just days after she arrived in the Philippines from her workplace in Dammam, Saudi Arabia on August 29.
“We have suspicions all along that she would turn out negative of having Mers-COV. We have known that since Thursday based on information provided to us by medical authorities in Saudi Arabia. But, to avoid confusion, we waited for the result provided by the RITM (Research Institute for Tropical Medicine,” Lee Suy said, insinuating they would rather err on the side of caution and be proven wrong rather than be confronted with a full-blown epidemic.
Earlier, it was feared that the nurse would be the Philippines’ first known case of Mers.
“As it turned out, all tests are negative,” Lee Suy said.
It was reported earlier that doctors in Dammam, Saudi Arabia, had cleared AP for travel to her home country despite suspicions that she was infected with Mers. Medical authorities in the Philippines said that the patient was “asymptomatic” or did not show symptoms of the medical condition when she was examined in Dammam.
Nurse AP had worked on suspected Mers patients in Dammam in Eastern Saudi Arabia. Another nurse at the same hospital, CB, a friend of AP who accompanied her on their flight to the Philippines, also tested negative for Mers at the onset.
AP and CB flew in on August 29 aboard Saudi Airlines flight SV870. After arriving from the Philippines, AP stayed for two more days in Bulacan, north of Manila where CB and her family lives.
All passengers on flight SV 870 and a Cebu Pacific flight SJ 997 that AP boarded were advised to undergo tests and voluntary quarantine.
On September 2, AP volunteered for confinement and underwent tests for Mers. CB and her family went through the same tests and all were proven negative.
With the two nurses cleared from Mers, the Philippine health department lifted its requests for the passengers of the two flights — Saudi flight SV 870 and Cebu Pacific SJ 997 to undergo medical tests and go on voluntary quarantine.
The Philippine health department said Mers “is a highly fatal respiratory illness presenting an influenza-like illness characterised by fever, cough, and often with diarrhoea.”
Worldwide, reports placed the number of fatalities from the disease at close to 300 in 20 countries.
