Makati Mayor Abby Binay. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines — Metro Manila might shift to a modified general community quarantine (MGCQ) status by February and March this year depending on the number of coronavirus disease cases in the country, Makati Mayor Abby Binay said Tuesday.
“We are ready for MGCQ at the end quarter of last year but we decided to still use a GCQ [general community quarantine] classification and yes, I am very confident that hopefully, by February and March we [Metro Manila] will classify as MGCQ,” Binay told ABS-CBN News Channel when asked about the possibility of placing the metropolis under MGCQ this year.
“Again, it would really depend on numbers that would appear. If we end up like Canada, remember, after Thanksgiving, in Canada, there was a spike, and then it was downhill from there. So it would depend on the numbers that would be arriving in the next couple of days,” the mayor added.
The Department of Health (DOH) previously said Canada’s seven-day average of new COVID-19 infections soared to 5,000 cases per day after the Thanksgiving holiday.
However, the health department recently announced that they have until Jan. 15 to determine whether there is a spike of coronavirus disease infections due to New Year and Christmas celebrations.
For the whole month of January, Metro Manila is still placed under the less strict GCQ.
As of Jan. 4, the Philippines reported a total of 478,761 cases of the severe respiratory disease, including 448,279 recoveries and 9,263 deaths.
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