Gov’t hints keeping GCQ in place
The IATF consistently maintained that adjustments in quarantine restrictions would always be ‘data-driven’ and science based
Malacañang on Friday dropped broad hints the quarantine restrictions set up over the National Capital Region (NCR) and places like Cebu and Davao will likely remain in place when President Duterte announces the decision on Monday.
This is based on latest reports showing the number of COVID-19 infections has not been convincingly arrested and has in fact been growing and forecast by experts to expand from more than 24,000 at the moment to over 40,000 by the end of the month. Health officials under Department of Health (DoH) Secretary Francisco Duque and colleagues at the Inter-agency Task Force on Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF) consistently maintained that adjustments in quarantine restrictions would always be “data-driven” and science based as millions of lives are at stake.
Equally at stake is the economic health of the $356 billion economy already forecast to slip into a period of recession because of non-economic restraints.
Malacañang acknowledged the continued rise in COVID-19 cases does not lend kindly to the hoped-for end of socioeconomic restrictions imposed on businesses and the population under general community quarantine (GCQ).
“Well, I would say it does not inspire relaxation. But the announcement, as I said, is subject to appeal and will be announced by the President” himself on Monday afternoon, presidential spokesman Harry Roque said.
There are those who anticipate an easing of restrictions when the strictures under GCQ at present is finally eased to modified GCQ and those who fear a reversion into the more restrictive modified enhanced community quarantine (MECQ) that only recently ended.
Roque also acknowledged the IATF has already taken a position and has made its recommendation known to President Duterte.
“The IATF has made its recommendation to the President,” Roque said in a broadcast interview Friday morning, without detailing any of it.
What is known is that COVID-19 cases in the Philippines rose to 24,175 after the DoH logged 443 additional cases.
The University of the Philippines previously released a study projecting the coronavirus disease infections in the country hitting 24,000 by mid-June should government ease up on the quarantine restrictions.
Roque would not want to second guess President Duterte, emphasizing only that whatever the decision might be would be based on immutable data.
Nevertheless, he likewise said the question of lifting or keeping the quarantine restrictions in place has to be balanced by need for the economy to breath again and for businesses to pick up where they left off.
He reiterated hard data is important in decision-making and it could be that the UP experts are correct in their forecast.
“We have acknowledged before that the infection numbers will rise as long as there is no vaccine against the virus. But we are concerned more of the country’s capacity to provide medical intervention for those who are stricken versus the need to reignite the economy, for people to engage in productive labor again because while we may not die of COVID-19 we might perish from hunger for the lack of fruitful endeavor,” Roque said in Filipino.
According to the presidential spokesman, the IATF has made the correct decision to reopen the economy, albeit on limited capacity and said the death rate from the infection is single digit only and that most of the sick were mild cases that allowed the health infrastructure to provide adequate critical care.
Roque, at the same time, advised those who leak documents from the IATF to let the President announce the decision himself as nothing is final until Duterte bares it himself.