Cebu City Health Office head, Dr. Daisy Villa. (Contributed photo)
CEBU CITY – The Cebu City Health Office (CCHO) has urged residents to follow health protocols to avoid contracting conjunctivitis or sore eyes.
Dr. Daisy Villa, head of the CCHO, said the city is on alert against this common disease that usually occurs during the hot season, although the number of cases listed in her office is not alarming.
“It's not that significant, but we don’t need to worry because conjunctivitis is mostly viral and self-limiting. The eyes will turn red unless there are eye discharges, that's the time that we will treat it with anti-bacterial medications,” Villa told reporters.
While the health office is still gathering data for April, May, and June, Villa said their monitoring of the disease found that there were 29 cases of sore eyes recorded last March.
She said in 2022 alone, the city health office recorded a total of 65 cases the whole year round.
Meanwhile, in the island town of Bantayan, its municipal health officials held a massive information drive to educate their constituents on how to prevent
sore eyes infection.
Although their health office is yet to gather data, Bantayan Health Officer Samantha Tinsay said they have noticed so many cases of conjunctivitis among the residents.
“Sometimes, the therapy and supportive care for conjunctivitis is to apply a cold compress. If it is a result of an allergy, the patient needs to take an antihistamine pill. If it’s a product of bacterial infection, that's the time to seek a doctor’s consultation because not all antibiotic eye drops are effective in sore eyes,” she said.
Both Villa and Tinsay said that properly observing health protocols would protect people from this eye disease that is most often spread through direct contact with the eye by hands or objects that are contaminated with the virus or bacteria.
Villar said allergic conjunctivitis is not contagious. (PNA)
