The Philippines Has Just 2,000 Virus Testing Kits and Cases Are Rising

(Bloomberg) -- The Philippines, with a population of more than 100 million, had only 2,000 novel coronavirus test kits available earlier this week as the number of infections jumped.

Its government once had 4,500 kits in stock, but the number dwindled to 2,000 by Monday as the number of people who wanted to be diagnosed surged, Health Assistant Secretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said on Monday. Confirmed cases in the Southeast Asian nation had increased to 33 on Tuesday.

The limited number of testing kits is constraining the country’s ability to test more people for the virus, Health Secretary Francisco Duque said this week, making people showing any symptoms a priority.

The shortage of diagnostic kits in the Philippines underscores resource constraints and rising costs that countries face as the virus spreads globally. Singapore said on Monday that it would stop funding treatments for short-term visitors including tourists while testing will remain free for everyone.

“Will we test 104 million Filipinos? That doesn’t seem to be the correct approach,” Philippines’ Duque said on Tuesday.

His comments came after Senator Nancy Binay criticized health officials at a hearing on virus preparations for their seeming lack of readiness to deal with the outbreak. “I don’t want to panic but you’re making me panic,” she said.

On the brighter side, a testing kit developed by the University of the Philippines’ National Institutes of Health was accredited by the Food and Drug Administration on Monday. There are also 2,000 other kits expected to arrive from the World Health Organization this week, the health department said.

Economic officials recommended 2.92 billion pesos ($58 million) in extra health funding to boost testing and contact tracing, Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez said in a briefing.

Test at Home

Elsewhere in the region, Singapore developed its own coronavirus diagnostic kit, according to a Facebook post from Deputy Prime Minister Heng Swee Keat, and they are prepared to ship them to other countries.

In Malaysia, people without symptoms but want to be reassured they’re okay can pay private companies to be tested at home, Noor Hisham Abdullah, the country’s director-general of health, said Monday. IHH Healthcare Bhd.’s Pantai and Gleneagles hospitals and Qualitas Medical Group Sdn. clinics are among those involved in the program.

--With assistance from Ditas Lopez, Philip J. Heijmans, Yantoultra Ngui and Andreo Calonzo.

To contact the reporters on this story: Clarissa Batino in Manila at cbatino@bloomberg.net;Claire Jiao in Manila at cjiao5@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Cecilia Yap at cyap19@bloomberg.net, Karen Leigh

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