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| Andanar announced the contamination within his office a day before the President's 5th SONA |
A total of 25 Covid-19 infections has hit the Presidential
Communications Operations Office and its attached agencies.
Of these, 19 were directly under PCOO, President Rodrigo
Duterte’s media operations office headed by Secretary Martin Andanar, who
confirmed the news today, Jul 26.
The Philippine News Agency reported separately that there
was one fatality among the 19 cases, but did not give details.
PNA further reported that government printer Apo Production Unit has one case
and one death, Presidential Information Agency and Radio Television-Malacanang
have two cases each, and PTV-4 has one.
Two personnel of Radio Television-Malacañang are also infected,
said Secretary Martin Andanar, head of the Presidential Communications
Operations Office.
Andanar made the disclosure on the eve of Duterte’s fifth State
of the Nation Address tomorrow.
“We regret to inform everyone that, as of 2:10 pm of July
26, 2020, we have 19 Covid-19 active cases among our personnel who were
infected while performing their duties to the public,” Andanar said in a
statement sent to media organizations.
He said some of the infected personnel were involved in the
production of communication materials as well as TV and radio programs that support
Malacañang’s daily briefings.
The PCOO has its offices in the New Executive Building at
the Malacañang compound on Jose P. Laurel St., San Miguel, Manila.
He said the PCOO immediately conducted testing and contact
tracing of primary and secondary contacts of the infected personnel among the
office staff to minimize the transmission of the virus.
The entire skeleton workforce of his office will also
undergo testing.
“From thereon, we have intensified our testing and contact
tracing to include all of our skeleton workforce in order to ensure everyone’s
safety,” Andanar said.
He said the PCOO continues to assist and support the families
of infected staff as it ensures the safety of all of its personnel against the
virus.
Andanar said a Covid-19 Response Team has also been formed
to coordinate all his office’s contact tracing, testing, monitoring, and
isolation/quarantine efforts.
He assure the Filipino public that the delivery of essential
and timely information to them Filipino public will continue despite the contagion.
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Work has been suspended at the New Executive Building due to
the contagion and employees of the media affairs office have adopted a
work-from-home arrangement, Andanar said.
Radio TV-Malacañang will also be under a two-week lockdown,
and contact-tracing and testing of close contacts of the infected personnel is
under way, Andanar also said.
For the SONA tomorrow, RTVM will be deploying a different
team composed of individuals who had no contact with the infected personnel, he
said, adding that a contingency plan is also being put into place.
Andanar said the PCOO prepared three separate Zoom
viewing rooms for Cabinet officials, local chief executives, Sangguniang
Kabataan officials and overseas Filipino workers.
“These virtual viewing rooms will cater to select
individuals who cannot be physically present during the address,” he said.
