Medical group wants mandatory masking outdoors back amid rise in COVID cases

MANILA, Philippines — The Private Hospitals Association of the Philippines (PHAPI) is appealing for the return of the mandatory wearing of face masks even outdoors amid the recent increase in COVID-19 cases in the country.

PHAPI president Jose Rene de Grano on Tuesday said hospitals have observed an increase in active and daily COVID-19 cases in the past two to three weeks. However, they cannot tell if this is due to the voluntary masking outdoors being currently implemented.

“For the past two to three weeks, medyo ating minomonitor ang pagdami ng kaso natin; parang nakikita po natin na tumataas po ulit ang mga kaso. ‘Yun po naman ay hindi natin masasabi na directly dahil dito sa hindi pag-wewear ng mask,” he said in public briefing.

(For the past two to three weeks, we are monitoring an increase in cases. But we cannot say if it’s directly due to those not wearing face masks.)

Despite this, De Grano called for that the mandatory masking outdoors to be reinstated so that the public would not be complacent about the disease.

“Sa aming mga medical workers, kung maaari siguro ibalik muna natin ‘yung mandato na mag-wear ng face mask lalo na kahit nasa labas dahil nakikita naman natin itong pagdami ulit ng cases,” he said.

(For us medical workers, we are asking if the mandatory masking could be reinstated even outdoors because we are again seeing an increase in cases.)

He, however, noted that despite the increase in cases, the number of hospitalizations remains the same.

The number of COVID-19 cases in the country saw a 22% increase for the September 19 to 25 period.

According to the Department of Health’s weekly case bulletin released Monday, the cases recorded climbed to 17,891 on September 19 to 25 from the 14,707 infections logged the week prior, September 12 to 18.

READ: DOH COVID-19 tracker: 2,001 new infections

Earlier this month, President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. ordered the voluntary wearing of face masks outdoors through Executive Order No. 3.

This is after the government’s pandemic task force, the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases, recommended the relaxing of the country’s mask mandate.

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