VP bets bare COVID-19 response plans in debate

FILE PHOTO A man getting swabbed for COVID-19.

MANILA, Philippines — Candidates seeking the vice presidency in the upcoming elections on Saturday revealed their respective COVID-19 response plans which they intend to implement should they get elected.

Speaking at the vice presidential debate hosted by CNN Philippines at the University of Santo Tomas, Senate President Vicente Sotto III said the government should focus on prophylaxis.

“Treatment, prevention, prophylaxis — I think we should go there. The vaccination program is good. But what do we do after six months?” said Sotto.

“So, I think we should be concentrating more on the prophylaxis. There are many new inventions or discoveries, I should say in the other parts of the world,” he added, noting that the Food and Drug Administration should expedite the approval of prophylactics and other preventive measures.

Meanwhile, Rizalito David said there should be a national consensus on how to address the pandemic.

“Firstly, kailangan magkaroon ng summit para magkaroon ng consensus ang scientific community kung ano nga ba itong magiging pandemya na ito. In this particular case, ‘yung COVID,” he said.

(Firstly, we need to have a summit so the scientific community will have a consensus of what this pandemic will be. In this particular case, COVID.)

“Ang nangyari po kasi sa atin kung ano-anong restrictions ang ating ginawa. Sa isang banda lamang ng siyensya ang ating pinakinggan. Maraming mga doktor at siyentipikong na nagsasbaing may gamot sa COVID, mayroon tayong pwedeng gawin, mayroong natural na gamot at hindi natin kailangang mag-lockdown,” he continued, saying that the government implement measures without listening to the scientific community.

(What happened to us, random restrictions were imposed. Only one side of science was listened to. Many doctors and scientists said that there is a cure, we can do something, there is a natural cure without lockdowns.)

On the other hand, Manny Lopez proposed a science-based, cost-effective, and pragmatic approach to the pandemic.

“My general prescription is for a science-based, cost-effective, and pragmatic approach to pandemic management because this is a crisis,” he said.

“We should make it a point that we have to have policies that specifically address the issues beyond political and commercial interests because this is what really bothers our pandemic response and we could do better and we could do better by caring more for each other and for caring for our country and our people, he went on.

Currently, the Philippines is at low risk for COVID-19.

The country logged 1,223 new COVID-19 cases on Saturday, bringing the overall case count to 3,660,020.

/MUF