Relatives of a man who died in a vehicular accident in Nueva Vizcaya are fuming after they discovered that hospital staff wrapped his cadaver with tape, just like a mummy.
Merwin Fabregas was brought to Region II Trauma and Medical Center for treatment on April 30 when he got involved in a road accident in Bayombong town. However, he was treated as a COVID patient and was even brought to a ward dedicated to treating the respiratory viral disease. He later died from his injuries.
“I just kept crying. It’s not what I wanted to happen,” the victim’s mother Mitchilou Fabregas Sapipi said in Filipino in an interview with the news program 24 Oras.
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“They didn’t care about him. They should have taken care of my son but that’s what they did,” the grieving mother said, and added that the hospital staff removed her child’s life support even if he was still allegedly alive.
However, the hospital’s medical director Dr. Napoleon Obaña said that Fabregas was brought to the COVID ward as a precautionary measure. Because he was a suspected COVID case at the time of his death, Fabregas’ cadaver had to be wrapped with tape.
The patient later tested negative for COVID.
“There is an upsurge of [COVID] cases in Quirino. So we want to safeguard those who live in Vizcaya. We have to treat it as a suspected COVID case because he might have infected other people. He might spread the infection,” Obaña said.
The doctor added that the life support machine was removed from the patient only after he had been declared dead.
“So we didn’t kill him,” he said.
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