5 more 'missing' ROFs from South Africa located —DOH

Five more of the eight returning overseas Filipinos (ROFs) from South Africa who have been initially unaccounted for have been located, leaving only two unaccounted for, the Department of Health (DOH) said Friday.

"Yes, we have already located another five, so we are just trying to locate two of these travelers," Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said in a message to reporters.

The DOH earlier announced that one of the ROFs was located on Wednesday

In a media briefing, Vergeire said the two ROFs have addresses in Region X and Region IV-B.

“It has already been endorsed by the Bureau of Quarantine-Clark to the local governments for our RESU or local governments verification of their current quarantine status,” she said.

Vergeire said both arrived in the country on November 22 with one testing negative on December 3 and the other testing negative on November 28.

The eight were among the 253 travelers from South Arica who arrived in the country from November 15 to 29, before the Philippines enforced temporary travel restrictions over South Africa and several other countries over the Omicron variant.

Vergeire said 99 passengers have been verified, 76 of which are in facility quarantine, 10 are in home quarantine, and 13 have been discharged after completing the 14-day quarantine.

Of the discharged individuals, 12 were not re-tested as they had no symptoms while one tested negative.

Meanwhile, in an interview on CNN Philippines on Friday, Health Secretary Francisco Duque III said two of the ROFs are undergoing facility-based quarantine with pending RT-PCR test results, one is undergoing home quarantine with a negative result, and one has completed his 14-day quarantine and has been discharged.

Duque said he is considering proposing to the Inter-Agency Task Force, which he chairs, and the Department of the Interior and Local Government to publish the names of the remaining unaccounted travelers.

“Well, what I’m planning to suggest to the IATF and to the DILG, but we need to clear this no because there are legal implications in having their names printed or published para malaman nung kapitbahay ito pala 'yun, hinahanap ka,” Duque said.

“That could be helpful but it’s not without possible legal consequences,” he added.

Despite the possible legal obstacles, Duque said he would still push for it.

“But we will still push it. We'll push it and see to what extent we can do that, because I strongly feel this is a weakness in the system,” he said.

The DOH earlier said the eight provided incorrect or incomplete information upon their arrival, making it difficult for authorities to trace them.

For now, Duque called on the public to provide the correct information in their health declaration forms.

Meanwhile, Vergeire said the agency does not see any reason to make the names public “at this point in time.”

“Because nalo-locate naman po natin sila. We just need to intensify ‘yung kung paano natin sila nalo-locate dahil may addresses naman tayo na naibigay nila. Bine-verify lang kung talagang matutunton natin sila sa specific addresses na naibigay na ito,” she said.

(Because we can locate them. We just need to intensify how to locate them in the addresses they gave. We are just verifying if they can really be found on the addresses they gave.)

Vergeire said they want to preserve the rights of the travelers.

Further, the health official said they must still investigate why the ROFs provided incorrect or missing information.

"Bagama't merong sanctions, may penalties, may batas na naba-violate, kailangan i-verify pa rin natin. What were the circumstances that led them to give us incorrect numbers or unreachable numbers," she said.—KBK/AOL, GMA News