EXCLUSIVE: Data obtained by Rappler shows hundreds of patients waiting days to weeks in emergency departments before being admitted. The Department of Health does not include such numbers in its public tracker.
As President Rodrigo Duterte decided to once again loosen quarantine restrictions in Metro Manila and 4 adjoining provinces, hundreds of patients continue to suffer while waiting for admission in hospitals overwhelmed by the surge in coronavirus cases.
Data obtained by Rappler from the Philippine College of Emergency Medicine (PCEM) showed that, as of Monday, April 12, at least 310 COVID-19 patients needing hospital care were still waiting for beds across all 14 of its training institutions in Metro Manila – the center of the pandemic in the country – and Cavite.
The 14 hospitals, though just a fraction of the 159 health facilities in the region and a neighboring province highlights the strain under which public and private hospitals operate as infections have yet to significantly decline.
