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Tuesday, March 19, 2024

Metro mayors go for GCQ retention, DILG says

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Interior Secretary Eduardo Año on Friday said most Metro Manila mayors want to keep the region under a general community quarantine (GCQ) as the country was poised to breach the 300,000 mark in COVID-19 infections.

Año, vice chairman of the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF), said he would meet the mayors Sunday and listen to their recommendations and compare these with the data they had.

Año spoke to reporters on the sidelines of the inauguration of Taguig City’s COVID-19 mega-complex facility which will host the new city-run Molecular Laboratory, the Lakeshore Mega-quarantine facility, and the Lakeshore National Testing Facility.

Virus death toll nearing 1 million
MEGA-FACILITY. Interior Secretary Eduardo Año, Health Secretary Francisco Duque III, and other officials of the National Task Force on Covid-19 lead the launching of Taguig City’s mega-facility on Friday (Sept. 25, 2020) along with Taguig Mayor Lino Cayetano. The mega-facility is touted as a showcase of pro-active response to the virus pandemic and would be shown to other local government units so they could also adopt its best practices.

Taguig Mayor Lino Cayetano said he would also consult their own city health office, barangay and local leaders based on relevant data on the COVID-19 situation.

“We as mayors are conservative because we see the details first-hand,” he said.

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Cayetano also cited the need to keep the balance between public health protection and economic recovery.

Metro Manila and the provinces of Bulacan, Batangas, and the city of Tacloban are under GCQ.The rest of the Philippines are placed under MGCQ, the most relaxed quarantine classification.

Lanao del Sur, Bacolod City, and Iligan City are under modified enhanced community quarantine (MECQ) until the end of the month.

The Philippines on Friday logged 2,630 new COVID-19 cases, bringing the total to 299,361 infections since the pandemic began, the Department of Health (DOH) reported.

This marked the fourth consecutive day in which fewer than 3,000 new cases were reported.

The DOH reported 494 new recoveries, bringing to 232,399 the number of patients who have recovered from the disease.

The DOH also reported 69 new fatalities, bringing the death toll from COVID-19 to 5,196.

There are 61,766 active cases, 87 percent of which are mild; 9 percent of which are asymptomatic; 1.2 percent of which are severe; and 2.8 percent of which are critical.

The top regions with cases in the recent two weeks were Metro Manila, with 921 cases, Region 4A with 589 cases and Region 6 with 169 cases.

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