Clear-cut guidelines on community quarantine needed, says Poe

MANILA, Philippines — While recognizing government measures against the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), Senator Grace Poe on Friday underscored the need for clear guidelines on the community quarantine imposed in Metro Manila.

With the community quarantine in place, Poe called on authorities to ensure that public utility services would not be disrupted.

“We recognize efforts of the government to implement bolder steps to address a public health crisis. However, these measures need clear-cut guidelines to avoid public confusion and ensure effective enforcement,” Poe, chair of Senate committee on public services, said Friday in a statement.

“Concerned agencies must see to it that the community quarantine in Metro Manila would not disrupt public utility services,” she added.

President Rodrigo Duterte on Thursday night approved the imposition of community quarantine in Metro Manila to prevent the transmission of COVID-19.

The community quarantine will halt land, domestic air, and domestic sea travel to and from Metro Manila starting March 15, 2020 until April 14, 2020.

“Everyone must be guaranteed clean water supply, sufficient food, credible and up-to-date information, reliable means of communication and transportation,” Poe stressed.

“As a nation, we have gone through many challenges and have proven that with our mettle, unity and cooperation, we can weather all crisis,” she added.

Apart from the community quarantine, the President also announced the extension of class suspension in the entire metropolis until April 12, 2020.

The Philippine government has also upgraded its alert on COVID-19 from Code Red Sublevel 1 to Sublevel 2, which is hoisted when there is evidence of community transmission and prevalence of cases beyond what the government can address.

The World Health Organization (WHO) now considers COVID-19 a pandemic, which means a new virus is causing sustained outbreaks in multiple regions of the world.

To date, the country has 52 confirmed cases, including five fatalities, due to COVID-19, a respiratory disease caused by a novel coronavirus that first emerged in China’s city of Wuhan in Hubei province in late 2019.

The virus causes mild symptoms such as fever and cough for most people but can cause serious illness such as pneumonia for others, especially older adults and people with existing health problems.

EDV