Residents of Dumaguete and Negros Oriental heaved a sigh of relief Friday after a suspected case of meningococcemia proved to be a false alarm.
The five-year-old patient was brought to the hospital Wednesday with symptoms of the dreaded disease. Tests were done, and samples were sent to Manila, which eventually declared that the girl’s case was not meningococcemia or any other dreaded disease.
As of Friday morning, Integrated Provincial Health Officer Chief Dr. Liland Bustamante told reporters that the girl was already up and about, and that she started playing.
Dr. Kenneth Coo, medical director of the Holy Child Hospital where the patient was first examined at the Emergency Room, had said in text messages on Wednesday evening that the case was “suspected meningococcemia” and that the patient was already isolated at the Negros Oriental Provincial Hospital where she was transferred.
The patient had to be transferred to the Provincial Hospital which has an Isolation Room built for special upper respiratory and infectious diseases like the SARS virus.
Photos and posts on Facebook said the Holy Child Hospital was “locked down”, but sources there said it was just the ER that was cordoned off for sanitizing purposes.
As word broke out on social media regarding the suspected meningococcemia case, people were reported to be in frenzy, with some pharmacies running out of face masks, while other posts advised staying away from the local hospitals.
To quell the “meningococcemia scare”, Gov. Roel Degamo and Dumaguete Mayor Felipe Antonio Remollo issued statements to the public, appealing to them to stay calm, and to be responsible with their online posts or forwarded messages.
A message from the Governor asked the public to “refrain from concocting stories” until the laboratory test results were out, and until the Department of Health released an official statement.
“And so as not to put Dumaguete and the entire Province in a bad light, we strongly advise the public to stop making up stories, especially in social media platforms that would cause undue public panic,” the appeal read.
Remollo also appealed for sobriety while City Health Officer, Dr. Ma. Sarah Talla explained that “meningococcemia-bacterial infection (is) caused by neisseria meningitidis which may be spread by respiratory droplets and close contact.”
“An infected person may manifest with macupapular lesions later becoming vesicular. It can be spread through respiratory secretions and close contact in cough and sneeze manners,” Talla said.
The City Health Officer advised the public to make hand-washing a regular habit, and to avoid crowded areas to minimize the risk of infection. (Judy F. Partlow/PNA)
