{"id":362434,"date":"2022-02-18T06:06:08","date_gmt":"2022-02-17T20:06:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=362434"},"modified":"2022-02-18T06:06:08","modified_gmt":"2022-02-17T20:06:08","slug":"muna-says-omicron-sub-variant-may-possibly-be-here","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/muna-says-omicron-sub-variant-may-possibly-be-here\/","title":{"rendered":"Mu\u00f1a says omicron sub-variant may possibly be here"},"content":{"rendered":"

Commonwealth Healthcare Corp. chief executive officer Esther L. Mu\u00f1a said Tuesday that the omicron sub-variant that was confirmed over the weekend to be in Guam could possibly be here in the CNMI as well.<\/p>\n

Speaking at the House of Representatives Health and Welfare Committee\u2019s meeting in the House chamber, Mu\u00f1a said it does take a while for CHCC to receive the sequencing data to show whether or not that the omicron\u2019s sub-variant is here. CHCC sends its samples to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for genome sequencing.<\/p>\n

Mu\u00f1a said the omicron sub-variant BA-2 is more infectious and could be here because they are seeing several cases of quick transmissions.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Muna<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It was committee chair Rep. Christina Marie E. Sablan (D-Saipan) who had asked Mu\u00f1a what they know about the omicron sub-variant that was just reported early this week to have been detected in Guam, and if it\u2019s been also detected in the CNMI as well.<\/p>\n

It was reported that the Joint Information Center confirmed that the latest set of COVID-19 virus samples sent from Guam to Hawaii for genome sequencing indicates the omicron sub-variant BA.2 is in Guam. <\/p>\n

The omicron BA.2 is often referred to as \u201cstealth\u201d because it\u2019s harder to detect. Although it\u2019s not reported as more severe, BA.2 is more transmissible than the original omicron strain.<\/p>\n

Mu\u00f1a, however, assured that they do have treatment for such sub-variant and even a new treatment that was just approved last Monday.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo the allocations for the CNMI is coming. We\u2019ll be ordering that. And all of them have been shown to be effective for this variant,\u201d Mu\u00f1a said.<\/p>\n

The CHCC CEO also underscored the importance of getting booster shots. \u201cThere\u2019s already data showing that, as the months go by, you do see the effectiveness waning down. So we need to be able to try to encourage individuals that if you\u2019re due for it [booster], you really do need to take it, get the vaccinations,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

When asked how many CHCC staff have themselves been infected by COVID-19, Mu\u00f1a said 120 to 150 out of 900 employees have been infected since the beginning of the pandemic.<\/p>\n

Mu\u00f1a said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has already come out with a guidance on strategies to mitigate healthcare personnel staffing shortages during the pandemic, and that per CDC guidelines, CHCC can implement crisis staffing. By crisis staffing, she said, even if the staff are symptomatic and had tested positive for COVID-19, they can still work. <\/p>\n

The CEO said they can\u2019t just shut down a hospital department where employees are infected, because it\u2019s a necessary department.<\/p>\n

\u201cOtherwise, CMS [the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services] will come around and say. \u2018Why are you not providing this service?\u2019 So that\u2019s when crisis staffing takes effect,\u201d Mu\u00f1a said.<\/p>\n

When asked for clarification, Mu\u00f1a said Wednesday that she is not aware if they have employees who are symptomatic and are reporting for work.<\/p>\n

\u201c[I\u2019m] just saying that, per CDC, if it comes to it, they can be allowed to work,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Commonwealth Healthcare Corp. chief executive officer Esther L. Mu\u00f1a said Tuesday that the omicron sub-variant…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":362436,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-362434","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362434","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=362434"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362434\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/362436"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=362434"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=362434"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=362434"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}