President Rodrigo Duterte on Monday (Sept. 20) directed the Department of Health (DOH) to probe the reported “false positive” COVID-19 RT-PCR test results from the Philippine Red Cross (PRC).
In his public address on Monday, he said he was informed that 44 out of 49 or 89.79% of hospital personnel and 187 out of 213 or 87.79% of the Presidential Security Group who tested positive in PRC’s molecular laboratory turned out negative in another molecular laboratory.
About 13 officials from the Finance department, Duterte said, also experienced the same.
“Because of this information, then maybe the DOH must investigate this matter. You could be putting more people at risk. You could be falsely adding to the total positive cases per day of this country,” Duterte said.
He then questioned the accuracy of the case count being released to the public.
“Ilan ‘yung nadagdag doon sa positive sa isang araw, daily attack, na negative? Nasali na doon sa numero na napakarami na ang nagkasakit. How sure are we now in our figures in the veracity and truthfulness of the test combined, marami man rin nagpunta diyan sa Red Cross? How do you backtrack? If it is impossible, what do you intend to do?” Duterte asked.
Meanwhile, in a separate public briefing on Tuesday (Sept. 21), Presidential Spokesperson Secretary Harry Roque said the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM), which is under DOH, has been directed to investigate to ensure that the machines used for COVID-19 testing are yielding accurate results.
“Kaya nga pinapa-imbestigahan natin para we will make sure that the tests are in fact accurate. Now we know they’re not perfect but we are taking steps to make them more accurate,” Roque said.
He added that RITM may conduct an assessment “at a random basis” to ensure that there will be no error in the release of RT-PCR test results. – Report from Eunice Samonte, PNA/CF – jlo
