Fixing the flaws in PH’s anti-Covid shield

TWO recent incidents have exposed serious flaws in the country’s anti-Covid-19 shield. Last Sunday, police closed down a swimming resort in Caloocan City that was teeming with holidaymakers enjoying a summer outing, in total disregard of health protocols. No one was seen wearing face masks or face shields, and the safe-distancing rule was flagrantly ignored.

On Tuesday, the Department of Health announced that the coronavirus’ Indian variant has reached the Philippines despite a ban on travelers from the pandemic-ravaged country.

The first incident illustrates the insouciance of local community officials in enforcing even the most basic health measures. The second highlights the need to recalibrate the country’s border control system.

The Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) has ordered the chairman of the barangay where the resort is located to explain why such a huge crowd was able to assemble without his being aware of it. The chairman said he had warned the resort owner that his establishment was not allowed to operate under modified enhanced community quarantine rules. He did not say when he was coming around to implement a closure order.

The 500 visitors at the resort that day are not without fault, either. Many of them gave the lame excuse that they thought the restrictions had been eased because it was Mother’s Day.

It is this kind of halfhearted enforcement of health protocols that emboldens people to thumb their noses at authorities.

It is time the DILG cracked the whip on weak-willed local officials. The success of the country’s Covid response depends largely on how it is being implemented at the local government level.

The same sense of determination must apply to sealing the country’s borders against the onslaught of foreign viruses.

The first cases of Covid-19 were able to slip in because the government dilly-dallied in banning travelers from China. By the time flights from China were suspended, the infected foreigners who had arrived earlier had transmitted the virus to the locals.

The country’s Covid-19 count stayed at manageable levels until the UK variant arrived and again because the order for a travel clampdown came too late. The fast-spreading variant is responsible for the explosive increase in the country’s Covid-19 caseload.

The same pattern seems to be repeating in the way the government is handling the “double mutant” B1617, which was first detected in India in October. Initial studies showed that the strain spreads more easily, and the World Health Organization has classified it as a “variant of global concern.”

The Philippines banned travelers from India for two weeks beginning April 29, when it became evident that the Covid outbreak in that country had grown to catastrophic levels.

Just days earlier, two Filipino seamen arrived in Manila from the Middle East. The first flew in from Oman on April 10. After testing positive for Covid, he was quarantined until another test on May 3 cleared him for release. The man was allowed to leave for his hometown in Soccsksargen.

The second seaman arrived from the United Arab Emirates on April 19. He too tested positive for Covid-19 and was isolated until May 6, when he was declared recovered. He went home to Bicol.

Only after genome-sequencing samples from their tests were examined did authorities find out that the two were infected with B1617.

What is intriguing is that neither of them had traveled recently to India.

According to the Covid treatment czar, Health Undersecretary Leopoldo Vega, the implementation of the travel ban was “kinda late,” implying that the two cases could have stayed in quarantine had the Indian variant been detected earlier.

Vega said border controls need to be improved and the 14day quarantine strictly enforced.

He also suggested that vaccination efforts must be stepped up. As more vaccine shipments arrive, health authorities see the pace of inoculations rising considerably. But it must be complemented by a more aggressive campaign against vaccination hesitancy.

A more disciplined enforcement of health regulations, tighter border controls and a smoother vaccine rollout will help reinforce the country’s shield against the coronavirus.