LA TRINIDAD, Benguet – Benguet Caretaker Congressman and Anti-Crime and Terrorism through Community Involvement and Support (ACT-CIS) Party-list Rep. Eric Go Yap disclosed that the molecular laboratory of the Benguet General Hospital (BeGH) will be operational anytime after the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM) shall have issued the accreditation of the latest testing laboratory.
Yap, who chairs the powerful House Committee on Appropriations, added that BeGH personnel who will be assigned in the first molecular laboratory outside Baguio City are now undergoing training with the RITM as a requisite for the issuance of the accreditation of the same prior to its full operation.
Congressman Yap, together with regional and provincial health officials, conducted an ocular inspection of the completed molecular laboratory in preparation for its upcoming operation probably by next month.
Further, Congressman Yap claimed that the BeGH molecular laboratory has its own reverse polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and automated extraction machines after retrieving the ones earlier loaned to the Baguio General Hospital and Medical Center (BGHMC) where the same was replaced so as not to compromise the operation of the sub-national testing center in the north.
The Benguet Caretaker Congressman reported that the BeGH molecular laboratory is part of his efforts to significantly increase the testing capacity of the province’s health facilities and ensure the immediate test results for Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) that will allow the timely adoption of appropriate medical interventions for the isolation of confirmed COVID cases and the quarantining of the close contacts of COVID patients.
Congressman Yap earlier shelled out from his personal resources the funds used to construct the building of the molecular laboratory within the BeGH compound and the purchase of the RT-PCR and automated extraction machines that were loaned to the BGHMC.
According to him, the presence of a molecular laboratory in the province will boost the ongoing efforts of the different municipal and provincial governments to have suspected and probable COVID cases tested for immediate medical interventions that will abate the continuous spread of the deadly virus in the province that might compromise the existing health care system.
Moreover, he stipulated that the molecular laboratory could also help in the monitoring and surveillance of other infectious diseases that might break out in the province, thus, he is inclined to fully equip the said laboratory to be functional to help ascertain the percentage of the province’s population that have contracted the deadly virus as part of early detection and prevention.
The first floor of the molecular laboratory will be used for the equipment while the second floor will be used as an additional training center for the hospital’s health personnel and health workers from the different municipalities in the province. By HENT
