The Negros Occidental Procurement Services Depot that is believed to be the main source of the COVID-19 spread among the provincial government employees has been closed, Provincial Administrator Rayfrando Diaz said Wednesday, May 5.
A legislative assistant at the Sangguniang Panlalawigan tested positive Wednesday bringing the number of provincial government employees hit by the virus to 32, Diaz said.
Ten of the 15 PSD employees tested positive for COVID-19, he said.
The five PSD employees who tested negative have been assigned to other tasks. The depot will be reopened when all of its ten other employees, who are now at the Mambukal Resort in Murcia, have recovered, he added.
The PSD personnel are the ones who distribute the provincial government’s supplies from the Department of Budget and Management in Manila to the different offices at the Capitol, Diaz said.
The depot will be disinfected and the standard procedure for accepting shipments from Manila will be reviewed, he said.
“Sometimes we are not careful, we think the carriers of the virus are people only, but maybe the items we receive are also carriers of the virus,” he said.
“We will sanitize all supplies that arrive starting now,” Diaz said.
Employees who do not feel well will also not be allowed to report back to work until they are cleared with negative RT-PCR test results, he said.
This is one of the measures being implemented to protect the rest of the employees and keep the workplace safe, he added.*