The Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth) is covering the costs for coronavirus testing for individuals seeking treatment. Cabinet Secretary Karlo Nograles states that citizens should not worry about the medical expenses on top of the virus’ widespread. Usual prices for the testing procedures may cost up to P3,000 to P5,000 each.

“The last thing we want is for our citizens to worry about medical costs and expenses.” Nograles states. “Their only concern should be their well-being and the well-being of their families.” He adds that PhilHealth president and chief executive officer Ricardo Morales was in the process of formalizing the new measure.

Reports also state that government officials are working overtime to provide testing kits to areas affected by COVID-19. The recently approved testing kits made by University of the Philippines scientists will be coupled with gene sequencing at the Philippine Genome Center in order to aid field testing of the disease more effectively.

The testing kits are now set for a field validation study. Only 500 tests for COVID-19 are needed to validate the operation and enable them to conduct clinical sensitivity analysis as a pre-condition set by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

“Once it passes the clinical tests, the FDA will grant full access by all hospitals, as guided by the DOH (Department of Health),” he said.

Private hospitals are also intended to join the field validation while the National Institutes of Health is aiming to secure validation from the ethics committee by Friday.

As of writing, the DOH has reported 33 cases of COVID-19 in the Philippines, including three local transmissions. This has led the President to declare a state of public emergency in the country.

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