 Welcome to Kalosugan Ay Karapatan. I am Dr. Menchit Padilya, your host for today. This is part of a series of episodes on COVID-19. COVID-19 was first detected in Wuhan, China in December 2019. In March 11, 2020, the WHO has declared this novel coronavirus outbreak a global pandemic. The COVID-19 pandemic has affected almost every country around the world. As of May 2020, this disease has infected over 3.5 million people with more than 250,000 deaths worldwide. In the Philippines, the number of COVID-19 cases is almost 1,000, with deaths over 630. Lockdowns and other strict measures were put in place to protect the people and to minimize transmission of the virus. With these measures being relaxed and lifted in many areas, people should be educated, engaged and empowered to adjust to the new norm in order to protect themselves and their families from this disease. In this episode, we have Dr. Regina Burba, Associate Professor of the UT College of Medicine and Chair of the Hospital Infection Control Unit of the Philippine General Hospital. We are going to discuss how we can protect ourselves from COVID-19. Good day, Dr. Nina. Hello, ma'am. Hello, Chancellor. I'm very happy to be here today. Well, thank you for accepting our invitation, Dr. Nina. You have been part of the care of patients with COVID-19 at the Philippine General Hospital and at the same time, we actually turn to you if you want to protect ourselves, the health workers from COVID-19. So it's but we have the best person actually in our midst right now because she is the go-to person as far as COVID-19 and protection of oneself. But before we go to the topic of protecting oneself, can we just have a very brief background on COVID-19? Although we had a first episode, we'd like to share some information with our viewers who are coming in only for the first time. So as you said, the etiologic agent or the virus that's causing this very contagious illness is called the SARS-CoV-2. This was first described in Wuhan, China during the early parts of December, but later on we learned about it in the first days of January. And soon the virus, the viral infection started to spread in many countries until the outbreak was declared by the WHO in February and later on this was stepped up to fall for a pandemic which started to gain a lot of aggressive measures from all countries. So what's very striking about the COVID-19 is that it's a very, it's a highly contagious illness and the mode of transmission is mainly human to human. And I think we can discuss that a little bit more. Thank you, Dr. Dina. Atapito Davili is protecting oneself. In the past couple of months, actually the past few months and many weeks, the main concern of an ordinary person is how we can protect ourselves, oneself from the virus. So can we now talk a little about how we can start protecting oneself, Dr. Nina? So we need to first understand how this virus is transmitted, possibly transmitted from one person to the next. So it starts off with an infected individual who will start maybe talking, maybe coughing, maybe sneezing, laughing, singing. And it is these activities that will lead to the spread of what we call infectious droplets. So you could see, sometimes you could see this, there are visible droplets that come out of the mouth of the person and these droplets are the ones that are highly infectious. So a person who's about maybe within three feet of distance may possibly inhale this or maybe these droplets will end up in one of the mucus membranes and cause an infection or perhaps some of the droplets will fall into surfaces and the hands of unsuspecting people around him will touch these surfaces and then later on the hands, the contaminated hands will get into their nose, their eyes or their mouths leading to transmission of the infection. Dr. Nina, I found something very interesting in your statement. You said that even singing, naman naman ang Pilipino, mahilid gumanta, it's not just about sneezing or coughing. So any other action that can actually transmit the droplet is going to be important. Alaman naman natin ang mga Pilipino, mahilid gumanta. So yung din pala, ay dapat natin ang mga Pimalsan. Am I correct, Dr. Nina? Pore, kahit nga nagsasalita ko, yung normal speaking, of course, the more the effort is, kung niya rin ang paggumakan, sa pag-very vigorous yung coughing, mas we think na di expel siya na more droplets. Saka meron yung force that leads to the movement of the droplets farther on. So mas parang mas malaking distance, mas malaking area na pwede maging infectious in a way. So let's start at home. We have, especially during the ECQ, we probably have the great majority of our viewers at home. How do we start protecting ourselves at home? Dr. Nina. Okay. So yung panay na natin to na rinig na rin sa radio, at saka sa TV. And I really like to stress na, these are very important. So kung isipin natin, panong aba na i-infect? So it's really being within three feet. They say sometimes six feet. Malayo na yung six feet, that's two meters away. Pero definitely within three feet, pagkahanan dun ka sa parang firing range ng droplets no possibly infectious person, then you could also get infected. So that's the principle behind what we call social distancing or physical distancing. We'd like to be away from the yung circumference talagyan. Three feet circumference away. Kung pwede yung six feet circumference, it's even better. But three feet should be fairly safe. So one of the dictum of the ECQ is to maintain that physical distance between persons. And we can start that at home. Onyari di mo alam kung san galing si mommy or si daddy or some other people like maybe kasang pahainat and lumapas yan. But then for the meantime, we maintain that kind of distance. And then the next one, so physical distancing is one. This next major principle or strategy is hand hygiene. So hand hygiene means using either sa bahay natin madaling-madaling kumota sa sink para magpugas ng kamay. So let's use that soap and water. Pagkahan, lumabas tayo ng bahay. Pwede rin tayo meron small bottle of alcohol. Both of these are, the intention is to disinfect the hands. That means mapapatay natin yung virus very effectively and efficiently by just doing this either one of these hand hygiene strategies. And of course, the next one is using the face mask. Kasi kung niya le, both ways yun eh, more kung ikaw meron kang kontin sniffles, meron kang kontin sipon, maybe upo, maybe sore float, then putting a mask on will effectively stop the transmission from you to other people. And the other side of it is kung may mga people around you tas hindi mo nang kontro kanyari, meron kambisita, tapas nag-uubu siya, gusto mo na siya paalisin, but you're very polite in trying to be, you know, courteous. Ped, you wearing a mask and him wearing a mask will also cut down the risk of transmission. So yun po yung three main ways even at home that we can reduce transmissibility. Number one, maintaining physical distancing. Number two, hand hygiene. Number three, wearing a mask. At number four, yung environmental cleaning. So that means maintaining our surroundings very clean. Okay. Dr. Nina, you mentioned hand washing, and papanda ba tayo katagal betap at maghugas ng kamay? Can you guide our viewers on what is the best way to do hand washing? Well, alam nyo one good thing about the pandemic kasi, ano eh, infection, ako yung in charge mo ng infection control teaching the students and the healthcare workers in PGH. For the longest time, this is really one of the most difficult tasks to make people wash their hands. Pero ngayon parang magikali lahat maghugas ng kamay. So the right way to do it is to really spend time in front of the sink with the water running, wet your hands and then pour some liquid soap or the bar of the soap and make a lather so that there's enough lather covering all the surfaces of your hands. Mga 20 seconds yun eh. You can sing a song or just usually by the time ma finish mo mag-form ng lather at mag-wins ng hands together and wash off all the soap that's about 20 seconds already. So that's sufficient. Okay. Yun pwede ngoin yun or yun nga yung use of alcohol using the same motions. We teach the students and of course mothers, people in the community to just look at their hands and make sure that the soap or the alcohol covers all the surfaces of the hands. Parang, parang pendeba yun sabihin, chansy, palm to palm, door zoom over the palms and then fingers interlace ang tawagan yun. Tapos walk yung thumbs tapos yung tips of the finger yun yun po yung mga different parts of the hands that need to be first washed with water and then debrided with soap or alcohol. So Dr. Nina, can you tell us the right way to do the hand washing? Ang sinasabi natin if you sing happy birthday two times, sabi nila nakaabot tayo nantamang oras para sa paghugasang kamay pero what is the right way of washing your hands? So usually I tell the students or when we're in the community, the mothers, the Parang Gainal workers, you just look at your hands, stay in front of the faucet and then let the water run over your hands. Tapos put either liquid soap or use the bar soap and then palm to palm usually mal five times yun tapos doorsoom over the palm both sides and then fingers interlace five times again tapos yun back of the fingers, no? So you rub them five times and then the thumb very important five times also and then probably the most important especially for health care workers yun fingertips. So five times, five rounds minsan yun iba ganyan and then the other one and then by then usually kung alcohol ginagamit mo medyo to yun na yun eh or kung tapos na yung usually may lather na yung hands mo, magramin ng lather then you rinse them over the flowing water by then mga more than 20 seconds sayang din and that should be suffocation. Usually di ka nakailangan magsing ng happy birthday song twice. Usually once lang ay okay na. Okay. So dapat talaga magkarun tayo na a certain habit no that if you can if you whether it's counting whether it's singing pero dapat talaga mabuhu talaga sabi ang mga yung about 20 seconds of washing and we will do this at home and that is your advice Dr. Nina for everybody who's viewing us right now this is the way to correctly wash our hands. Yes, this is the correct way of washing our hands and there are two parts of good hand hygiene. It's one, the technique and number two, when to do it. So at home alam naman natin na siyempre di ba tingin turan tayo na parent sadang panay before you eat yun yun deffin yun pero the other parts are before you prepare food after using the toilet and before in general ngayon every time you feel like when your hands are contaminated you touch something then the way to go is to really frequently wash our hands. In COVID, gusto mo to gawin panay kasi pwede ng contaminate yung hands mo with kaninangay what we said infectious droplets that you might have touched in some places whether in your home or outside your home and you want to get rid of all those viruses so the way to do it efficiently, good way to do it is to do good hand washing. So napakasibili na na that's free and must be done by everybody else. Gusto lang na susukan lang yun what about the mothers handling the babies? Kasi ang pag-inisip mo yun they are always taking care of the babies handling them is it exactly the same or may additional measures pa tayong dapat kubigay sa mother sa pag-alaga nila kasi ang baby connected sa mother laluklaging yung kasama are there any extra measures that a mother should do because she's taking care of a baby? Yung mami's lalo na kasi parang lahat ng hawakan niya kailangan malinis before mataks nga niya yung baby so everything may be more frequently than all other people in the home the mother should be more vigilant about doing the hand washing yes especially preparing baby food or let's say preparing herself to breastfeed taking care that there's no contamination about some mothers simila rin kasi yung nag-change ng diaper tapos next activity niya will be feeding the baby dapat in between like good hand washing siya nga you mentioned earlier that if you have we have patients we have parents who are working and then they come home and then of course how will you what will be the routine that we should do now for parents coming home to their homes gaya pa pa ang magiging ritual nila ngayong pagdating sa bahay? Yung parents believe it or not actually may rin palang occupational scoring risk scoring for COVID that be a network an occupational group in the United States put together trying to assess kung gano kaw risky kabag bilang magtakrabaho naman sa COVID and they base this on the amount of contact you have with potential clients or punyari mga doctor potential patients tapos how close you are with these people in the number of hours that you spend doing this activity so may mga occupations pala na talaga ang kaisang sports nila so ang pinakamataas were the dentists everything related to doing dental hygiene tapos the respiratory therapist tapos dun sa scores na yun mataas rin yung mga doctor at siya mga nurses these are all individuals giving close care to their patients so pag ganoon pa rin sa score ang mo siya ng high risk kung ikaw si mommy at si daddy coming home you really have to be careful not that the people who score lower will not be careful everybody needs to be careful in this time pero panang the degree of being panang almost obsessive compulsive ka about keeping clean everything needs to be there so parents who would be working now or later post the ECQ really need to think through the entire process of coming home so dapat as much as possible lahat ng possibly contaminated sa katawan mo hindi mo na ito papasak sa bahay mo alam niyo po ba na yung dun sa mga studies na look into where the virus would go dun sa mga areas where patients were ang pinakamataas na scores were the floors yung mga floor pala pagswinab mo nakita nila matakaas talagang concentration of the virus is there so iwiksa di hindi naman sa tinga touch naman natin yung floors as nililinis naman siya ng mga jan or is diba pero it just means that maybe this time of the year during this COVID pandemic iwan talaga natin yung ating shoes outside hod na natin siya ipasak sa home lalo na if we have babies na crawling our little children playing on the floor talaga nang careful kaya about that and then our clothes these are potentially dirty talaga so before we even say hello guys I'm home baka dapat kontakamon na sa sa bathroom have a full bath like ako nga parang araw-araw I never used to shampoo every day diba yung yung yung pinakamata normal yung yung ngayon talaga parang shampoo lahat clean everything even the back of your ears everything talaga change clothes have a separate file for the clothes that are perhaps contaminated separate from the others yun yun yung usually ritual na gagawin dapat na mga people coming home whose scores or patient's scores are higher than others well thank you doctor nina that's really interesting to know because there is because of this fear of you know contracting COVID-19 parang lahat kinatatakutan na but you're saying that may rong kang high risk at may low risk important thing is that you know how to clean yourself when you get home before you start mingling with the other members of the family and sabi nga eh no kissing and no hugging at this time no the most difficult part for grandparent so which brings me now to the senior citizens no so how can senior citizens protect themselves? sa the the experience from China in most other countries and even here in the Philippines really show na yung age is an independent risk factor for bad complications of the COVID-19 so as much as possible talaga dapat wag sila magkaroon ng infection so among everybody siguro in the home they're the ones you really like to stay home yun sometimes are I feel I'm not trying to be disrespectful but I feel na parang even if some of our lolas and lolas feel strong pa sila parang siguro stay home patalaga mo na at this time kasi you never know even if they feel they're not the usual 60 years old I think stay home yun stay home bottom line for our beloved older people in the home tapas we really try to encourage them to do the usual things that we do to try to protect ourselves also so parang mas greater yun protection natin sa anina parang sinabi mo talaga na yun so stay home no if we have you will have more they'll do more harm when you go out and help your family members do the errands this is the time we're in staying home will probably help your family better so one of those rare times okay so we've been may akawap issues pa about the home before we get out of the house because I'd like to discuss also how we will protect ourselves when we get out of the house are we still nere akawap ang gustong panggitin sa house just protecting inside the house yung analang siguro mention natin yung two things siguro that I'd like to stress yung tungko sa keeping the places clean things that are frequently held at home so mostly yun door knobs yung mga buttons ng light electric fans yun parang linis yan natin I wanted to it was in my mind kanina when I was talking na yung cell phone natin parang gusto ko yan talaga gusto bago ko umuwi one of the things I try yun sa nga feeling ko nasisira na yung phone ko kaka spray ko ng alcohol sa sa screen ng phone but you know it's one of the probably the most contaminated objects we carry from our offices or our hospitals into the home so kinang pangpasok nyan sa bahay na na disinfect mo na siya some people use plastic plastic wrap sila or they put it in a ziplock those are good things to do I think to keep the phone parang clean by the time you get them sa para sinasabi ng anything that's frequently used frequently touched must have special attention for cleaning okay and alcohol will be fine yes alcohol will be fine okay so of course you know especially for those who go out of the house they have to go to work we have to start we have to ask the question of how do we protect ourselves when we go to work well of course even if let's say there's no transportation but we have a lot of people still going out how can we protect ourselves aside from physical distancing how do we protect ourselves when we get to a to a bus or a jeep paana bang gadoin atin protection this time kasi reality yun eh oha actually mahirap isipin siya eh at saka until it probably happens we're not really sure how it will happen so sabi nila di pa may physical distancing but at the height of it's hard to imagine it will really really really happen and I'm sure on the first few days of you know getting the e-c-q lifted there will be some major commotion and confusion on how exactly it will happen pero yun I think people also want to cooperate and will probably want to sit away from others basta lang pa lang may systema by the time we do this so there must be some person who will show people guide them na o ito I think they started to put so parang nakakahelp yun sa mga elevators sa nga batatay o sa mga groceries sa nga batatay so I guess pag mag-open yung things like the LRT or the buses the cheap knees if they will be available for commuting makakaroon ng ganung classing guide to help us so aside from sitting farther away from each other yung holding them kasi di ba parang feel mo parang andami daming high-touch parts yung motion of transportation so yun din minsa niniisip ko minsa kasi people wearing gloves wearing gloves parang a suggestion ko siguro yung bis na we pour our money on gloves kasi na kakontaminate din siya napas I'm sure kung madumin na maghihinayang kaitapon siya ng itapon so ang mangyayari soot mo yung gloves buong day napas madumin din siya and it causes actually it harbors more not only the virus but a lot of bacteria and it's harder to clean gloves actually than just our bare hand so kung if I had an X number of pesos I probably will just invest on alcohol and just frequent alcohol use when I'm I'm outside the home so nito ako siguro gagamit ng gloves even if I feel madumin yung pera na hinawa ko madumin yung jeep ng tatangan na ko to I'll probably just keep a bottle of alcohol and use it frequently okay so mga viewers natin na gumagamit ang gloves kasi namin ko nakikita sa supermarket yun na naka gloves ka sila kapag sila ay nag siya shopping okay um when we were discussing this episode we were talking about a lot of myths and I'd like you to discuss the myths the most common myths as we are caring for ourselves during the the pandemic state so is it sa mga parang frequently kung naminig na myth is that's certain things that we eat or drink or consume probably will help reduce our risk for getting the corona virus so sabi lang WHO and many other studies na so far walang ganon so minsan di ba ang dami na natin vitamins na nabili dami na nabili yung mga kaibigan ako sa masakit na yung siya nila akainom ng maraming vitamin C but so far I'm sure if we take just one tablet a day it won't harm us but it probably still won't prevent the virus from happening viral infection from happening if it will happen to us there are people also who drink lemon juice yan ni mga sinasabi a lot of lemon juice or garlic or pepper yan yung mga ganong classic foods have not been shown to myth sila have not been shown to work there's some articles I've read about gargling daba gargling different substances supposedly to reduce the risk of the virus lodging into our throat but unfortunately none of this have been shown to really work so panang the bottom line is so far walang good methods or drinks or foods or medicines that have been shown to prevent the COVID infection even yung mga gamot yan panang yung mga ganun panang sige try mo probably won't hurt you so if you drink vitamin C okay lang basa alam mo na you're taking it because maybe you're not eating well enough you'd like to have some supplements pero yung taking some things that might harm you yung yung try natin iwasan so there are people by hydrochloroquine believing that taking them will maybe reduce the risk of getting COVID so I urge the public not to do that until we really know that hydrochloroquine would work siguro don't use it as quote and quote prophylaxis okay sir dr. Nina I mean I think from one thing is clear from what you've shared is that simple measures of handwashing and caring for one's health enough to really protect one's health from COVID-19 in the last few minutes of our episode I'd like you to give your message if you were to give three messages to the general public and with a focus also to mothers and senior citizens what will it be? I'd like everybody to know that to have to believe that this is a very highly contagious viral infection and the way to just try to protect ourselves from getting this viral infection is for me para clear kung we understand na let's try to do the physical distancing kasi you'd like to be as we said farther away from potential people who might have it so three feet is good six feet is probably better so that's one social distancing number two as we said hand hygiene hindi siya mahirap go in daming faucets around us at kung walang faucet maybe alcohol a little bottle in our bag will probably save us using the mask kung kung walang masyadong surgical mask may cloth mask should suffice for most people in their homes and in the community and number four keeping things clean so in other words really a lot of hygienic good hygienic practices that we should believe in will work for this COVID COVID 19 pandemic protection oh thank you Dr. Nina thank you for helping us protect ourselves from COVID 19 by using very simple measures thank you and we hope to see you again in another episode maraming salamat sayo thank you very much taking some simple precautions can actually reduce our chances of being infected or spreading COVID 19 keep up to date on the latest information from trusted resources such as the WHO or your local and national health authorities in doing so we protect ourselves as well as our loved ones maraming salamat sa inyong lahat this is kalasugan ay karapatan