PUERTO PRINCESA CITY, Palawan — A female high school student died in Palawan province’s Balabac town, believed to be due to the diarrhea outbreak that started earlier this January, affecting over 100 residents in 14 mainland barangays.
Town health officer Dr. Dennis Ponce de Leon confirmed Sunday that the 16-year-old who died recently was a resident of Sitio Torong, Barangay Salang, where a water source tested positive of E. coli bacteria by a Department of Health (DOH) team.
“Sixteen years old na babaeng high school student iyong namatay. Ang sabi baka daw na food poisoning dahil sa kinain na maliliit na isda. Baka nga food poisoning, ‘yon din ang suspetsa namin doon. Akala ko nga cholera, pero sa Barangay Salang, noong nag-test ng tubig sa water source, ang dami-dami ng E. coli ang nakita (It was a 16-year-old female high school student who died. The suspicion was she died of food poisoning after consuming small fishes. Maybe it’s food poisoning; it was also our suspicion. I thought it is cholera. But in Barangay Salang, when we tested the water from the source, we detected a lot o E. coli),” he said.
Ponce de Leon said they consider the diarrhea incidents already an outbreak since more than a hundred residents are already affected since the beginning of the year.
Some of the patients are allegedly members of the Molbog indigenous peoples (IP) community on the island town.
“Outbreak kasi mas marami ng kaso doon sa usual cases na nangyayari per month. Medyo mataas talaga. Mataas siya hindi ko lang alam ko ilang percent ang itinaas niya. At saka more than 100 cases na kami ngayong January lang (It’s an outbreak because we have more causes than usual per month. It’s really high. It’s high and I just don’t know how many percents. And, right now we are more than 100 cases just this January),” de Leon said.
Around 10 water sources that had been initially tested in four barangays in mainland Balabac all turned positive with E. coli, he added.
“We suspect that the cause ay itong mga human excretes, o kaya galing sa domestic animals papunta sa source ng tubig (We suspect that the causes are these human excretes or those from domestic animals that were washed away to the source of water),” de Leon explained.
He mentioned that aside from Salang, the other areas where diarrhea was detected were in Barangays Melville, Ramos Island, and Agutayan.
The DOH and the Provincial Health Office (PHO) are now helping Balabac with the distribution of Aquatabs to treat water for drinking and anti-diarrheal drugs.
“Tumutulong na noong onset pa lang ang DOH at PHO sa amin. Nagbibigay sila ng gamot pandagdag, at patuloy namin mino-monitor ang mga kaso (At the onset, the DOH and the PHO have been helping us) They gave medicine and we continue to monitor the cases),” he said.
Diarrhea patients are now being treated at the rural health unit of Balabac, and at the Southern Palawan Provincial Hospital in Brooke’s Point. (PNA)
