Nurse’s phone video drives home the alarming reality of Cebu’s Covid-19 situation

Cebu City is suffering a spike in Covid-19 cases, with 415 new infections and 11 deaths on Sunday alone. But nothing drives home the point quite like a frontliner’s firsthand view of the situation at a hospital.

The video was taken by the chief nurse at the Mandaue City Hospital, Maimai Maunes, and was posted on Facebook by her husband, JP. The video shows a medical team in full PPE standing outside by a private vehicle, with one person performing CPR on a patient lying on a stretcher.

“The current situation at the hospital is very difficult. [The hospital is] very full and we can no longer accommodate patients…Our staff nurse fainted from fatigue and hunger while caring for patients,” the chief nurse is quoted as saying in Cebuano. The caption goes on to say that two other patients died, both unvaccinated.

The video also pans to a parked white container can. “That’s a freezer van. It’s nearly full to capacity [with dead bodies],” JP Maunes told Coconuts over Facebook Messenger.

“I felt also that I have to share it so people will know the real situation in the hospitals,” he continued.

Over the weekend, images of cars and ambulances lined up outside a Cebu City hospital as patients slept in the hallways went viral on social media. On Monday, too, the city’s acting mayor, Michael Rama, said in a radio interview that he might have to ask for the national government’s help if the surge continues.

Read: Cebu hospitals are overwhelmed, as photos of cars lined up for oxygen goes viral