Baguio City Public Information Office (PIO) on Thursday, Jan. 11, reported 2,199 acute gastroenteritis in the area.

Mayor Benjamin Magalong expected the active cases to decline soon following the implementation of safety and preventive measures by food establishments and households after he declared a diarrhea outbreak in the city yesterday.

City Health Officer Dr. Celia Flor Brillantes seconded that thought, stating that the active cases were going down.

“We are getting a lot of reports already. However, yung onset ng illness nila is the past week. So ang active cases natin is going down. One-third of the cases can feel the symptoms,” Brillantes told DZRH in an interview.

Baguio City PIO said 492 of the total cases sought medical help in health facilities, with 64.4 percent of them experiencing symptoms. The majority of the cases were also reported to have eaten in food establishments.

Meanwhile, the Sanitation Division of the City Health Services Office and the Baguio Water District have gathered water samples from different suspected water sources of establishments to track the cause of contamination.

Magalong said 28 water samples were submitted, 16 of which already had tested negative for contamination while 12 were still awaiting results.

“Ongoing ang testing natin ngayon. We have the Baguio policemen helping us in the water sampling, meron tayong red cross na tumutulong sa atin. Bukas, kasama nating ang Department of Health (DOH),” Brillantes said.

“We hope that we will be able to find out and see what is causing the outbreak,” she added.

Brillantes also urged food establishments to stop giving service water coming from tap water.

“For all our food establishments, we refrain them from serving service water that are coming from the tap water, filtered. Kung pwede sana ay purified ang water or bottled water,” she said.