Lifting community quarantine restrictions unlikely to happen this year

In this photo taken on March 22, policemen guard the boundary of Cavite and Metro Manila as the national capital and its nearby provinces are placed under lockdown due to a surge in COVID-19 cases. INQUIRER file photo / MARIANNE BERMUDEZ

MANILA, Philippines — The lifting of community quarantine restrictions in the country is unlikely to happen this year, Malacañang said Monday.

Presidential spokesperson Harry Roque said such a decision has to be made by the government’s pandemic task force, the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF).

“That’s a decision to be made by the IATF ‘no pero tingin ko po, malabo pa iyan [but as I see it, it would be unlikely],” he said in a Palace briefing.

He made the remark after the Department of the Interior and Local Government said the national government is eyeing to do away with quarantine classifications so local chief executives should be ready with their own COVID-19 response measures.

Since the pandemic started in March 2020, President Rodrigo Duterte has been regularly announcing quarantine classifications of provinces based on their COVID-19 situation.

For its part, the Department of Health (DOH) said the easing of quarantine classifications and leaving the decisions to local officials is a “long term goal” of the national government, and is not likely to happen anytime soon.

JPV