Govt, Angkas partner for frontliners’ free rides
THE government partnered with motorcycle taxi firm Angkas to provide free rides to medical frontliners in select hospitals in Metro Manila, one of several areas that had been placed anew under a two-week modified enhanced community quarantine (MECQ) due to the rising number of coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) cases.
The agreement was reached on Friday among the National Task Force Covid-19 (NTF), the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) and Angkas as Interior Secretary Eduardo Año slammed critics of motorcycle barriers whom, he said, were neither pandemic experts nor in a position to make decisions concerning public health.
About 1,000 Angkas motorcycles would give rides to frontliners at the Philippine General
Hospital, San Lazaro Hospital, Ospital ng Maynila, Ospital ng Sampaloc, East Avenue Medical Center, National Kidney and Transplant Institute, Quezon City General Hospital, the Jose N. Rodriguez Memorial Hospital, Quirino Memorial Medical Center and the Dr. Jose Fabella Memorial Hospital. They would also be on standby at the end of the health workers’ shifts.
Angkas also provided protective shields, which have been approved by the Inter- Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases, to medical employees who own motor bikes and use them as transportation to work.
“It is an example of the public and private sectors working together in partnership. They are complementary to other government measures, like the NTF’s provision of dorms and hotels for the [health care workers],” said Angkas Chief Transport Advocate George Royeca.
Año urged critics to study the issue before commenting on it.
Speaking in Filipino, Año told a press briefing that there was no problem as far as expertise in motorcycles is concerned but being an “expert” on the pandemic is “a different matter altogether.” “It is the national and local government, along with the frontliners, who have the primary responsibility on public health and safety, Año said.
Lt. Gen. Guillermo Eleazar, commander of Joint Task Force Covid-19, said the project initiated by Angkas was helpful to the medical frontliners since it would ensure that they can “perform their tasks and not be hampered by lack of transportation on their way to work, and back home.”
Eleazar also said the barriers would be given to the medical frontliners.
The Philippine Society of the Mechanical Engineers Inc. had said that motorcycle barriers might “contribute negatively” to the safety, health, economy and environment.
The barrier would also not guarantee that it would protect the riders from the spread of the coronavirus, the group said.
Aside from Metro Manila, the provinces of Bulacan, Laguna, Cavite and Rizal are also under MECQ.