DILG can realign budget to rehire 35,000 more contact tracers — DBM

A contact tracing team of the City Epidemiology and Surveillance Unit (CESU) of Quezon City government conducts house to house tracing of possible COVID-19 patients in Brgy. Baesa in this file photo.   (INQUIRER/GRIG C. MONTEGRANDE)

MANILA, Philippines — The Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) can realign its budget to rehire the rest of the contact tracers it tapped in 2020, which is about 35,000.

“Notification ang kailangan po niyan, sandali lang po ‘yan, hindi na aakyat sa Pangulo ‘yan,” Budget Secretary Wendel Avisado said in a Laging Handa briefing.

(They only need to notify the DBM. It does not need to reach the President.)

“Dito na lang sa level ko ina-approve ko na ‘yan, walang problema patungkol diyan,” he added.

(I can already approve it at my level, there is no problem with that.)

The DILG earlier said it could only rehire 15,000 out of almost 50,000 contact tracers due to budget constraints.

The DBM approved a total of P1.9 billion for the hiring of contact tracers for 2021.

The 15,000 contact tracers will be employed for at least six months.

Last year, the DILG hired 46,338 contact tracers to track down close contacts of Covid-19-infected Filipinos nationwide.

The contact tracers’ contracts lapsed last Dec. 31, 2020.

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