A COVID-19 outbreak continued to grip Camp Lino Chatto in Macaas, Tubigon after 12 more Philippine Army (PA) soldiers tested positive for the disease while undergoing training inside the military base.

The new cases pushed the total tally of infected individuals inside the training camp to 65, said Bohol Inter-Agency Task Force (BIATF) spokesperson Dr. Yul Lopez on Thursday.

The soldiers were found out to be positive for the highly contagious disease through polymerase chain reaction testing which was carried out as part of contact-tracing efforts.

According to Lopez, all 65 COVID-positive soldiers have been isolated.

The PA personnel arrived in Bohol from various localities as APORs or authorized personnel outside of residence to train at the camp.

Camp Lino Chatto was recently converted into the headquarters of the Visayas Army Training Group.

The 65 cases inside the PA camp comprised almost half of the total active cases in the province at 131.

Lopez said that of the total tally, only 21 cases were identified as local transmissions. The rest were APOR, locally stranded individual and overseas Filipino worker cases.

Earlier, Tubigon Mayor William Jao appealed to the PA command to suspend the deployment of soldiers to the town as health authorities scrambled to contain the spread of the disease inside the camp.

The Tubigon LGU’s request was backed by the provincial government through the BIATF. (A. Doydora)