Mount Mayon still under Alert Level 3, says Palace
Mount Mayon remains in Alert Level 3, despite lava
flow activities early Sunday, a Palace official said.
"Batay sa pinakahuling ulat ng NDRRMC
(National Disaster Risk Reduction Management Council), umiiral ang Alert Level
3 sa Mount Mayon na ang ibig sabihin ay ito: that magma is at the center of the
volcano and that hazardous eruption is possible within weeks,” Presidential
Communication Operations Office Secretary Herminio Coloma, Jr., said an
interview over dzRB Radyo ng Bayan.
The NDRRMC estimated that the people in evacuation
areas have now reached some 12,931 families or 57,633 persons, from two cities
and five municipalities in Albay.
The Communications Secretary noted that the the
total combined assistance extended by the government and non-government
organization (NGO) is now at P88,773,524.
This came from the Department of Social Welfare
and Development (DSWD), the Office of Civil Defense, Department of Health
(DOH), Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), PhilHealth, Department of
Education (DepEd), the Philippine Red Cross, and other NGOs.
Coloma added that members of the Cabinet are set
to visit Albay to assess the situation in the evacuation centers.
These are Interior Secretary Mar Roxas, Social
Secretary Dinky Soliman, Health Secretary Enrique Ona, Defense Secretary
Voltaire Gazmin, along with retired Admiral Alexander Pama, the executive
director of NDRRMC. PND (ag)
DOH rolls out multi-sectoral response plan versus
Ebola - Palace
The Department of Health rolled out a
multi-sectoral response plan against the Ebola virus disease, Malacañang said
on Sunday, amid lingering concerns that it might enter the country.
Health Secretary Enrique Ona announced during the
first National Ebola Virus Disease Summit, which was held recently in Quezon
City, that this plan contains the interim guidelines for disease surveillance,
notification and reporting of suspected Ebola virus disease cases; clinical
management including laboratory testing from suspected cases; and infection
control.
Communications Secretary Herminio Coloma, Jr., in
an interview over the state-run dzRB, said the Research Institute for Tropical
Medicine (RITM) in Muntinlupa City would serve as the national referral center
for testing and analyzing emerging and reemerging infectious diseases using the
same methods being applied by the US Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention.
According to Coloma, the RITM had so far examined
18 suspected cases of Ebola, which all rendered negative results, thus making
the country still free from the disease.
“Ang lahat ng mga dapat na paghandaan ay
pinaghahandaan ng ating Kagawaran ng Kalusugan at pinapatatag ‘yung ating
depensa diyan sa Ebola Virus Disease at sa iba pang mga infectious diseases,”
Coloma said.
There are currently over 8,000 reported cases of
Ebola epidemic, which started in West Africa, with about 3,879 confirmed deaths
based on the October 9 figures of the World Health Organization. Countries
affected include Guinea, Liberia, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, and the
United States of America. PND (hdc)
