Never fake your swab test results

Romar Fernando

February 17, 2021

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  Photo Credit: Inquirer

  It is quite understandable for most of us to experience boredom and even anxiety and depression for being barred to go out of our homes nor to travel far from the city because of the on-going COVID-19 pandemic.

  The Philippine National Police (PNP) continues to remind Filipinos about falsified COVID-19 test certificates whenever travelling within the country or overseas.

  Recently, five tourists from Metro Manila were apprehended in Aklan for submitting a falsified reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) tests. They were about to visit Boracay Island on January 21 but authorities have verified that they have fake certificates.

  Interestingly, three of them got positive test results after being brought to the Aklan Training Center (ATC), the provincial quarantine facility in the capital town of Kalibo. The other two companions tested negative of COVID-19.

  After confirming that the results were falsified, an intense contact tracing were done at their hotel and those who may have come in close contact with the three infected persons.

  Since December 2020, authorities in the said region have intercepted as well as apprehended at least 26 tourists going to Boracay who submitted falsified test results.

  Those responsible for falsified test results would face fines ranging from PhP 20,000 to PhP 50,000 and up to six months imprisonment under Republic Act 11332 or the Mandatory Reporting of Notifiable Diseases and Health Events of Public Health Concern Act.

  It is punishable by law to do acts of “tampering of records relating to notifiable diseases or health events of public health concern, which includes official medical test results or medical certificates, or such other documents and records issued by public health authorities” as stated in section 1-b.

  Not calling it a karma, but then, our being reckless for the sake of having a luxurious vacation, may lead to the sickness of others or worst, our own dilemma of carrying the virus without knowing it.

  Let us continue to become our brother’s keeper amid this pandemic.

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