DAVAO CITY – The Department of Health (DOH)-Davao Region confirmed Thursday the detection of five cases of Omicron variant of coronavirus disease (COVID-19), including two returning overseas Filipinos (ROFs) who were tested in other regions.

Dr. Rachel Joy Pasion, head of the Regional Epidemiology and Surveillance Unit (RESU) of DOH-Davao, told a virtual press briefer on Thursday, Jan. 20, that three of these confirmed Omicron cases are ROFs while the two others are local cases or positive individuals with no history of any travel outside the country.

Three cases were detected from the 35 specimens that the regional office of DOH here submitted for whole genome sequencing (WGS) to the University of the Philippines-Philippine Genome Center (UP-PGC) last December 23 and 29, 2021, while the two others were tested in the National Capital Region (NCR) and Clark, Pampanga.

All five cases have already been tagged as recovered upon release of the sequencing results, according to Pasion.

The agency said the first confirmed case was a 23-year-old male returning Filipino who is a resident of Davao del Sur. He was swabbed at the Philippine Red Cross Clark Molecular Laboratory last December 18.

The second case was a 27-year-old female ROF, a resident of Davao City, who arrived from Singapore last December 18. Her specimen was collected and processed at the Southern Philippines Medical Center (SPMC) Molecular Laboratory last December 21, and was tagged fully recovered last January 2, 2022.

The third case of this variant in the region was a fully-vaccinated 44-year-old male ROF from the United Kingdom who arrived in Manila last December 22 and was swabbed four days later at the First Aide Diagnostic Center in NCR, on December 26. He underwent a 14-day isolation in Manila before coming home to Davao del Norte.

The agency added that a fully vaccinated 28-year-old female resident of Davao Occidental with no history of international travel was the fourth Omicron case of the region. She was swabbed last December 11 and her specimen processed at the SPMC Molecular Laboratory.

The region’s fifth case was a fully-vaccinated 63-year-old male, a resident of Davao Occidental with no history of international travel, swabbed last December 16, and his specimen processed at SPMC Molecular Laboratory.

Davao Region reported 1,428 cases on January 19, bringing the total cases to 109,888 with 4,989 active, 100,985 recovered, and 3,914 dead.

Meanwhile, Davao City, considered as the epicenter of COVID-19 pandemic in Mindanao, tallied 1,197 new cases on Thursday, which brought total cases to 57,980 with 3,698 active, 52,480 recovered, and 1,802 dead.

The agency said it is closely working with the local government units to conduct intensive case investigation to ensure that the isolation period is completed, that all close contacts adequately identified and completed quarantine, and that eligible samples for sequencing are submitted.

“Re-testing will be done but re-quarantine is no longer necessary unless the case is symptomatic upon location. For the respective LGUs of the non-OFW cases, they are currently back tracing to determine their exposures and travel histories,” she said.