MANILA, Philippines — President Rodrigo Duterte has announced that work in the public and private sectors would be limited to a work-from-home set up with the enhanced community quarantine in place in the entire Luzon region.
“It will be an enhanced quarantine during which the movement of everyone will be significantly limited. Work in the public and private sector should be limited to work at home arrangement,” Duterte said in a speech on Monday night.
“Kung pwede magtrabaho sa bahay mo, eh ‘di okay. If wala na, if you have no choice, you have to stay home,” he added.
(If you can work at home, then okay. But if you have no choice, you have to stay home.)
The President noted that going outside should be limited to just buying necessities like food and medicines.
“Everyone will stay home, leaving their houses only to buy food, medicine, and other basic necessities. Only such establishments that provide these necessary services will remain open,” he said.
Duterte tried to lay out the specifics of the “enhanced community quarantine” he ordered over Luzon, replacing the “general community quarantine” he imposed all over Metro Manila on March 12.
In a memorandum released by Malacañang, only those private establishments providing basic necessities and activities related to food and medicine production shall remain open.
This includes “public markets, supermarkets, groceries, convenience stores, hospitals, medical clinics, pharmacies and drug stores, food preparation and delivery services, water-refilling stations, manufacturing and processing plants of basic food products and medicines, banks, money transfer services, power, energy, water and telecommunications supplies and facilities.”
The respective management of such establishments should adopt “a strict skeletal workforce to support operations, as well as all strict social distancing measures.”
Health officials have so far recorded 142 cases, including 12 fatalities, related 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 country is currently under a state of public health emergency due to the virus, which originated from Hubei province in China.
The Philippine government has also upgraded its alert on COVID-19 from Code Red Sublevel 1 to Code Red Sublevel 2, which is hoisted when there is evidence of community transmission and prevalence of cases beyond what the government can address.
People who have COVID-19 could recover since for most people, its symptoms were mild like fever and cough. But the illness could also be worse or serious for others and possibly lead to pneumonia, especially for older adults and those with existing health problems.
The World Health Organization has declared COVID-19 a pandemic since it has already infected more than 160,000 people and killed over 6,000 in over 140 countries all over the world.