The Cebu Provincial Capitol will be shut down for disinfection from today until July 3 after 15 of its employees tested positive for the coronavirus.
In its announcement yesterday, the Cebu provincial government said that they will suspend face-to-face transactions in the Capitol but a skeleton staff will continue to work. It also said that 12 of the infected workers are residents of Cebu City, while two are from Mandaue City, and one lives in Talisay City.
“The Capitol was infection-free during the first imposed Enhanced Community Quarantine (ECQ) status in Cebu City. At that time, Capitol workers who are residents of Cebu City were not made to report for work. But when the first general community quarantine (GCQ) status was granted for Cebu City, its residents were allowed to report for work at the Capitol. It was at this time when Covid-19 infections started,” the statement said.
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Capitol employees will be working from home during the three days that their office is shuttered, “to pave the way for full disinfection and to allow the environment at the whole compound to breathe and rest,” the provincial government said. Work will resume on July 6, Monday.
So far, two Capitol employees have died of COVID-19. Their deaths occurred as Governor Gwendolyn Garcia urged workers to practice the traditional therapy of tu-ob, which she believed could prevent the spread of the coronavirus. However, the Department of Health said that the treatment does not prevent the spread of the virus or cure COVID-19, and the Philippine Medical Society even said that Garcia’s claims about the treatment were “dangerous.”
Recently, a photo of Garcia went viral because it shows her walking around the halls of the Capitol sans a facemask. When she was asked by a Facebook user why she didn’t use a mask, which the Duterte government has made mandatory, she angrily replied that she might end up inhaling the carbon dioxide which she had exhaled.
Garcia, however, didn’t provide any scientific evidence to back up her claim.
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