The Iloilo City Health Office (CHO) advised local food establishment owners to acquire health cards before they are permitted to operate.
“All business establishments in Iloilo City, especially those making frozen food, eateries, and hotels, are required to get sanitary permits,” explained CHO Sanitation Inspector IV Rudy Catahay. “Our sanitation inspectors are inspecting if they are compliant with requirements.”
“Any person who gets a health card is required to undergo some laboratory examinations such as stool and sputum tests,” he added. “If the result is okay, then they will be given a health card.”
If inspectors find personnel are operating without health cards or a business establishment fails to meet the checklist with the first inspection, they will be given six to 10 days to comply.
“If they failed a second time, they will be given another six days or [it depends] on the recommendation of the sanitary inspector,” Catahay stated. “The establishment is given three chances before we issue a sanitation order.”
“After the third issuance, if they still fail to comply, we then write a recommendation to the city health officer, [who then] writes a letter to the mayor for closure of the establishment,” he added,
A total of 71,872 health cards for personnel were issued by CHO in 2018./WDJ