The Department of Health on Friday it is not recommending using anal swabs to get specimens for COVID-19 testing as these are inconvenient.
“If you ask us at the Department of Health – if it’s really needed and there is sufficient evidence showing that it has accurate results, then the government will really think about it. It is really inconvenient for both the individuals and the health workers,” Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said during an online briefing.
Vergeire said there were studies claiming the virus may linger in the anus or in fecal matter longer than the respiratory tract, thus making anal swabbing viable.
But she said the technology of anal swabbing will still have to undergo validation with the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine and approved for registration with the Food and Drug Administration if it is brought into the country.
Anal swabbing is now being done in certain Chinese cities, serving as an alternative to throat swabs or saliva samples, which is partially being used in the Philippines.
On social media, Chinese netizens reacted negatively to the process, saying it is “low harm, but extreme humiliation.”
