Manila seeks flexible work hours due to virus
MANILA: Instead of firing their workers, a ranking government official urged employers to adopt flexible work arrangements to help keep their businesses afloat due to the diastrous impact not only on global health but also on the economy of the novel coronavirus ( COVID-19).
Labor and Employment Secretary Silvestre Bello said this was contained in an advisory he issued amid reports that many of the country’s big firms like Philippine Air Lines have started laying off workers due to heavy losses caused, among others, by the dreaded ailment.
“The adoption of flexible work arrangements is considered a better alternative to the outright termination of the service of the employees or the total closure of the establishments,” Bello stressed.
Under the advisory, Bello explained employers can either ask their workers to go on forced leave, implement a rotation of employees or reduce workhours or workdays.
These options aim to help businesses ride out the adverse health and economic impact of COVID-19, which have been adopted by several firms throughout the country, according to Dominique Tutay, the assistant labour secretary.
Tutay cited a report to the labour department that about 55 businesses with more than 3,500 workers in Western and Central Visayas as well as Soccsksargen in Mindanao have already adopted these options.
Meanwhile, the health department reported that a total of 68 Filipinos who arrived from a military study tour in South Korea on Feb. 21 have been instructed to a undergo a 14-day quarantine, with 19 of them found to be exhibiting signs of symptoms of the ailment.
“Those who exhibited signs and symptoms are in a referral hospital while others are in their posts where they are quarantined and are all under strict monitoring,” Assistant Health Secretary Maria Rosario Vergeire reported.
The military said the 68 officers and civilians who joined the study tour were composed of students as well as members of the Armed
Forces of the Philippines Command Staff General Court School at Camp Aguinaldo in suburban Quezon City in Metro Manila and some of their dependents.
In another development, Vergeire said 11 more Filipino crewmen the quarantined cruise ship Diamond Princess anchored in Yokohama, Japan would soon be repatriated after recovering from the dreaded disease.
Vergeire said the 19 were among the 80 Filipinos who contracted the virus while being quarantined for 14 days along with the 3,700 passengers and crew aboard the Diamond Princess.