MANILA, Philippines — The government was able to maximize the two-week modified coronavirus lockdown of Metro Manila and other high-risk areas to regroup and recalibrate its response to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, the Department of Health (DOH) said Wednesday.
The virus outbreak epicenter Metro Manila and the nearby provinces of Bulacan, Laguna, Cavite, and Rizal eased into general community quarantine (GCQ) Wednesday after a two-week modified enhanced community quarantine (MECQ) to give health workers a “timeout” and allow the government to beef up its response.
According to Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire, the government was able to use the time to strengthen its pandemic response especially in harmonizing initiatives of the national and local government units (LGUs).
“I think we were able to maximize (the MECQ) because we were able to go down to the ground. We were able to coordinate well with local governments and sana sa mga susunod na araw at linggo lahat ng local chief executives natin can adopt the strategies that we have initially implemented,” Vergeire told reporters in an online press briefing.
During the timeout, the Health official said the DOH was able to go down to the localities to analyze more the COVID-19 situation on the ground, established clearer “targets” and identified roles of key government officials and local chief executives.
“We have also established the LGU-led One COVID Referral System wherein yung public health idinugtong natin sa ospital,” she said.
Vergeire further explained that the government was able to ramp up hospital capacity by doing active surveillance in specific localities and immediately isolating and testing eligible individuals.
“Lahat ng ‘yan ginawa natin and of course we wanted to emphasize on our CODE strategy wherein we have coordinated operations. Dati kasi kanya kanya tayo ng kumpas. May mga local chief executives, meron national government, meron National Task Force but this time everybody is working together and there is this coordinated approach,” she said.
However, Vergeire said the effect of the modified lockdown in the spread of the disease would be known after “two to three weeks” due to the 14-day incubation of the respiratory illness.
“We cannot say as of this time kung ano yung naging epekto. We would require two to three weeks for us to be able to analyze what has been the impact of this 2-week MECQ,” she said.
As of Tuesday, there are 169,213 total COVID-19 cases nationwide, including 112,861 recoveries and 2,687 deaths.
More than half or 94,842 cases were recorded from Metro Manila.