Beboy extends care to his constituents via CSWDO

A MOTHER of two daughters who have been victims of human trafficking is thankful to Mayor Eric C. Codilla for the assistance extended to her by his administration through the City Social Welfare and Development Office (CSWDO). The woman is just one of the hundreds helped by the CSWDO.

Last Mar. 16, Lilia Agosto, 53 of Nueva Vista, here in Ormoc received a P10,000 check which she will use to start a small business. This is the latest assistance she received from CSWDO after the abuse suffered by her daughters. A single mother, she single-handedly tried to raise her 11 children.
 

Her 24-year-old daughter was trafficked when she was 13 to Cebu where she made to work as a prostitute. Agosto was forced to chain her daughter when she came back home mentally damaged. Another daughter aged 15 was also trafficked to Manila but denied being sexually abused, although she admitted that some men injected drugs on her which affected her psychologically.
 

Aside from the P10,000 check, the CSWDO will give P5,000 each to the two victims to be released by installment for their medication and regular checkup at Eastern Visayas Regional Medical Center in Tacloban. Today, Agosto’s daughters have restored their physical and mental health.
 

Agosto’s story is replicated by other individuals helped by CSWDO. The agency spent P2.7 million in 2011 for emergency assistance for medicines, surgical operations, transportation fare, blood transfusion, meal and burial assistance, and emergency shelter (see table below).
Just last Apr. 13 in the morning, daycare worker Dayin Sarcol and Gloria Malazarte who is in charge of children in conflict with law accompanied five mental patients (including the Agosto sisters) to EVRMC. One of them is a 38-year-old male nurse who suffered psychosis because of drug abuse.
 

The guy, who agreed to talk to the Express on condition of anonymity, said he began taking shabu in college back in 1993. The following year, despite a scheduled board exam, he began getting his fix from marijuana, solvent and cough syrup that he became paranoid and thought everyone was laughing at him.
 

He passed the nursing board despite his condition. He began treatment in 1991 and got employed as a registered nurse but stopped working in 2001. Since then, he has been under constant medication and rehabilitation as part of the road to recovery with the assistance of CSWDO. by Elvie Roman-Roa