THERE are still more than 100 beds available for COVID-19 patients in Dagupan if a surge in the number of confirmed cases continues.

This was reported to the Sangguniang Panlungsod on April 13 by City Councilor Celia Lim  in reaction to reports that the isolation facilities in Dagupan are already overflowing with patients and some have been on the waiting list for days before they could be finally admitted.

She told her colleagues that the isolation facility at the Arizona Inn in Bonuan Boquig  still has two rooms available while the engineering building in Poblacion Oeste still has 23 beds available.

She added there are still 20 available beds at the facility at the Waste Management Division building in Bonuan Binloc, and the 25 beds being made available at the privately-owned Inn Asia, for returning Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) who need to be quarantined before they can rejoin their respective families in the city, most of which are hardly used.

Lim said  Dagupeños have nothing to worry since those who tested positive for COVID-19  but are asymptomatic and with mild affliction, can all be accommodated in the city’s isolation facilities.

Persons who are symptomatic with moderate and severe infections have to be confined in hospitals that are more equipped for better treatment management, she said.

Meanwhile, Lim said the Trauma Hospital in Barangay Tapuac still has 25 beds available for symptomatic COVID-19 patients.

In the same session, Lim revealed that she is preparing a resolution that will ask all private hospitals in Dagupan to reserve 30 or more percent of their bed capacity to symptomatic COVID-19 patients in moderate and extreme cases.

She said the Department of Health has mandated private hospitals to reserve 20 percent  of their total bed capacity to COVID-19 patients, but added she wants the city hospitals to increase this to 30 percent or more of their bed capacities.

Amid reports that many private hospitals in Dagupan are already operating in full capacity after patients from the National Capital Region were admitted, Lim expounded on the need for Dagupan to put up its own hospital.

Her proposal drew instant support from Councilors Luis Samson Jr. and Cisco Flores.

Lim said her husband, late Mayor Benjamin Lim, sought to put up Dagupan’s own hospital during his term but this was not realized but expressed hope her son, Mayor Brian will make this come true.

Lim, can solicit help from the national government to make the project a reality. (Leonardo Micua)

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