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The Overseas Welfare Workers' Administration (OWWA) has been constantly coordinating with the Ministry of Health in Saudi Arabia regarding Filipinos with coronavirus disease infection, an official said on Friday.

OWWA Administrator Hans Leo Cacdac made the statement after Manila Shimbun reported that about 50 overseas Filipino workers with COVID-19 have allegedly been staying in a quarantine facility without health personnel looking after them and with insufficient and delayed provisions of medicine.

"Yes, we will help them. We have contact now with Saudi medical authorities. Just like in our country, it's also the Saudi Ministry of Health which is leading the anti-COVID responses. So, we are allowing the Saudi Ministry of Health to provide assistance," he said in the "Laging Handa" public briefing.

"So, what we are doing here is coordination. Our people are not hands-on, directly involved, because it's the jurisdiction of Saudi Ministry of Health," Cacdac said.

OWWA serves as the "bridge" between the OFWs who have been infected with COVID-19 and the Saudi MOH in order that they could be fully assisted, he added.

Cacdac said OWWA is also extending $200 cash benefit to OFWs infected with coronavirus.

He said they have distributed the cash aid to some 10,000 OFWs.

In the Manila Shimbun report, an OFW, who refused to be named and one of those quarantined, claimed that symptomatic and asymptomatic patients have been staying in the same room where social distancing could be difficult to observe.

She also alleged that after 10 days of quarantine, even if the individuals still show minor symptoms, their Riyadh-based recruitment agency would force them to return to work even without a new swab test to check if they are negative from COVID-19. Celerina Monte/DMS