Zarate: Gov’t COVID-19 response should include whole PH, not just Metro Manila

MANILA, Philippines – A lawmaker has asked the government to include the whole country and not just Metro Manila in responding to threats of the COVID-19 outbreak.

Bayan Muna Rep. Carlos Zarate said on Thursday that the Inter-Agency Task Force on Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-EID) — which includes the Department of Health (DOH) and other government agencies — should fast track the use of COVID-19 testing kits so that other regions can use it.

Zarate’s statement came amid reports that several persons under investigation in provinces have already died even before they were subjected to confirmatory COVID-19 testing.

“Today, it was reported that three (3) persons under investigation (PUI) in the Davao region already died while awaiting test confirmatory report from the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM),” Zarate said.

“We have received reports also that two (2) PUIs in Tarlac and another one (1) in Iloilo already died but the confirmatory results if they indeed were COVID-19 positive are not yet available.  Now we will never know because the protocol is that the bodies would immediately be cremated,” he added

According to Zarate, this could have been avoided if only the government placed testing kits in regions outside of Metro Manila.  He also said that DOH’s tally is questionable since it supposedly focuses only in the National Capital Region and its nearby provinces.

“This could have been prevented if there were already testing and confirmatory centers, at least in regional centers, all over the country that could have been done earlier,” he noted.

“The COVID-19 tally of the DOH is now becoming suspect if it is mainly concentrated in the NCR and environs and not being pro-active and aggressively done also in the other regions of the country that have contracted the disease,” he added.

As of Thursday, the enhanced community quarantine that President Rodrigo Duterte placed prevails only in Metro Manila and the entire Luzon.  However, other cities in Visayas and Mindanao, including Duterte’s hometown Davao City, have already stepped up measures to prevent the COVID-19 from spreading.

READ: Davao leaders OK closure of entire region’s borders in fight vs COVID-19

DOH said that there are 217 confirmed cases in the Philippines, 17 of which have already died.  At least seven have recovered, while there are six patients who were allowed to go on a home quarantine mode.

READ: Luzon now under ‘enhanced community quarantine’ – Palace

READ: BREAKING: Total of COVID-19 cases in PH now at 217

The COVID-19 is a respiratory disease caused by the novel coronavirus that first emerged in China’s city of Wuhan in Hubei province in late 2019.

The International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses named the novel coronavirus as SARS-CoV-2.

Coronavirus is a family of viruses, whose surfaces have a crown-like appearance. The viruses are named for the spikes on their surfaces.  Worldwide, over 193,000 COVID-19 cases have been recorded, 7,865 of which have died.  On the other hand, another 81,743 patients have recovered.