Mayor notes DOH data ‘discrepancies’ again

By Francis Allan L. Angelo

 

Iloilo City Mayor Jerry Treñas said he will lodge an official complaint with the Department of Health (DOH) regarding “discrepancies” in COVID-19 data of the city.

“Today (Nov 4, 2020) we have only registered 2 cases so far while yesterday we had 9 cases. The DOH website, however, reported that we have 41 cases today and the city has the 5th highest cases in the country. I need the guidance of what is happening to the data reporting of DOH. I am making this official complaint for DOH to clarify this data and where these numbers come from.”

A check with the DOH central office’s official Facebook page indicated that the 41 new cases in Iloilo City that were reported on Nov 4 were based on laboratory test results as of 12 pm of Nov 3.

But both the Iloilo City Covid-19 Emergency Operations Center (EOC) and DOH-6 regional office reported that the city only logged 9 new cases on Nov 3.

This is not the first time that Treñas complained about DOH’s COVID-19 data on Iloilo City.

In October, the mayor wrote Health Secretary Francisco Duque III and DOH Region 6 to ask for appropriate actions to resolve the conflicting data released by the DOH COVID-19 Case Bulletin and the Iloilo Epidemiological Surveillance Unit City Health Office.

A case in point were the numbers released on Oct 10, 2020, particularly the number of cases in the city and province of Iloilo.

Trenas pointed out that 80 cases were reported in just one day in Iloilo City when in fact the number was the cumulative cases from Oct 4-9.

“DOH released that there are 136 total new cases in Iloilo while the Iloilo CESU-CHO recorded only 24 new cases. When the city government inquired on the same, a representative from your Department responded that the 136 total new cases was in fact a combination of the total new cases from Iloilo City and Iloilo Province pointing out that 80 out of 136 is attributed to the former. However, it must be noted that the 80 cases were not all new cases for a single day (October 9, 2020) but were in fact the accumulative number of new cases beginning October 4, 2020 until October 9, 2020,” the letter reads.

Trenas said that “to continually publish data in this manner breeds deception and propagates misleading information. Relevant, and accurate data about COVID-19 is important to manage the situation for an urgent and targeted response.”

“As such, it is most respectfully requested that appropriate actions be taken in order to resolve this contrast in data so that confusion of the public is avoided. In these perilous times, the duty of disseminating accurate and correct information is imperative,” he added.