BAGUIO CITY — The city government’s hope to achieve a zero firecracker-related casualty this year was dashed by one “passive” case recorded on December 28, the city information office revealed on Saturday.
City Information Office chief Aileen Refuerzo said the City Epidemiology Surveillance Unit (CESU) of the City Health Services Office (CHSO) reported the incident on Friday.
CESU head Dr. Donnabel Tubera described the victim as an 18-year-old male from Pinsao Proper barangay who sustained an injury in his small finger (right hand) caused by a piccolo which was lit and thrown by a child on the road while the victim was passing by.
He was attended as an outpatient at the Baguio General Hospital and Medical Center (BGHMC).
The Department of Health classifies “passive victims” as those who do not use firecrackers and merely bystanders.
Tubera said this was the first firecracker-related injury recorded this year in the city.
Last year for the same period, the city had zero case, Tubera said.
At the close of New Year revelry in 2016, the city had a total of eight injuries recorded although 15 submitted themselves for check-up.
Refuerzo said the CHSO advises the public that “there is no safe firecracker and pyrotechnic devices.”
“If injured, wash wounds with flowing water for five minutes then rush to the hospital; fo not pick up unlit ‘paputok’ and just join community fireworks display manned by a pyrotechnician,” she said. (PNA)
