Private sector supports the two-week lockdown to save lives and livelihood
FOLLOWING the recent confirmed reports of Delta variant cases in the country, Presidential Adviser for Entrepreneurship and Go Negosyo Founder Joey Concepcion, in consultation with the private sector, supports the proposal of implementing a 2-week lockdown to mitigate the spread of Delta variant to save both lives and livelihood.
“We have to protect the lives of the most vulnerable ones most especially our unvaccinated kababayans and continue the aggressive vaccination rollouts while addressing the problem of Delta,” Concepcion said.
Concepcion also highlighted the importance of the 4th quarter to the business sector. “It is the most important quarter of the year. This is where consumers spend Christmas. Election spending will also come. Most businesses who lost their income from the previous months will be able to recover,” he added.
This proposal is in lieu of the OCTA research recommendation to have a Circuit Breaker Hard Lockdown in NCR for 2 weeks because “once a Delta surge begins, it accelerates in an explosive fashion.”
According to OCTA research, the projection based on the behavior of the Delta variant in our ASEAN neighbors suggests that the surge will begin to impact our healthcare system in NCR by the middle of August and hospitals will become overwhelmed by the end of August.
“No ASEAN countries have reversed the surge without locking down major cities. The longer we wait, the harder we can reverse the surge.”
Meanwhile, Concepcion has expressed his full support should the government push for a 2-week lockdown similar to the one we had last March this year. “We prefer that we solve the problem early and not wait for the problem to get bigger, because then we will have a lockdown for months. That is the most catastrophic thing in our country if that happens in the 4th quarter,” Concepcion said.
Concepcion stressed: “If we have to do it, let us do it. Let us prepare for it. We have to be decisive. We have to move quickly.”