More news about how the COVID-19 pandemic in the Philippines is being handled by the public and the government.
A Department of Health (DOH) official in Region 9 warned that the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) pandemic has brought another health crisis that is now affecting many Filipinos.Dr. Joshua Brillantes, DOH-9 assistant director, said Wednesday that losses in jobs and livelihood have affected mental health, leading to widespread psychological trauma, fear, depression, and even suicides.“This is important especially at this time there is Covid-19 where there are a lot of Filipinos who lost their jobs. These financial problems will lead to psychological stress and mental health problems,” Brillantes said.Brillantes emphasized the need for affected individuals to be open with their problems and seek guidance from experts to help them cope with and face the problem.
The 23 villages within the town center of Catarman, the capital town of Northern Samar, have been placed under enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) starting Thursday due to rising cases of coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19).
Under Resolution No. 12 signed by members of the Municipal Inter-agency Task Force against Covid-19 signed on Oct. 13, the stricter movement restriction takes effect from October 15 to 30.
The body passed the resolution after receiving reports that areas within the town center have 47 active cases of Covid-19. All of them are residents of the town’s 23 villages near the commercial center.
ECQ suspends all face-to-face classes in public and private schools, restricts work in offices, strictly implements stay-at-home policy, and limited operations of enterprises.
Businesses that are allowed to fully operate are hospitals; healthcare providers and frontline services; industries involved in farming, fishing, and forestry; and delivery and courier service providers. Government and private entities have been ordered to observe a skeleton workforce.
The operation of all types of public transport at the town center has been suspended for 15 days. Liquor ban will be strictly enforced and mass gathering is also prohibited.
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| https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/1348678/govt-relaxes-quarantine-persons-aged-15-to-65-now-allowed-out |
It's an arbitrary restriction and I see young children outside all the time. It's as if no one is really enforcing this "law." Is it a law?“Persons from 15 to 65 years of age are now allowed to go out,” presidential spokesperson Harry Roque said in a statement.
“Local government units may impose a higher age limit for minors, depending on the COVID-19 situation in their respective jurisdictions,” he added.
President Rodrigo Duterte’s Cabinet previously approved easing quarantine age restrictions.
Under the previous policy of the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases, those aged below 21 to above 60 years old are required to stay home with the exception of work and accessing necessities.
The gradual decrease in the daily number of coronavirus cases stems from a change in people’s behavior and the effectiveness of advertisements featuring President Rodrigo Duterte.This was the explanation given by Secretary Carlito Galvez Jr., the chief implementer of the Inter-Agency Task Force on Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF), during the President’s late-night briefing on Wednesday.
“‘Regarding the drop in our cases, one factor is the change of behavior of the people because we had a commercial that included you, along with what we call infomercials from the business sector. Those are the two factors that we saw having traction,” Galvez, speaking partly in Filipino, told Duterte.
“And we believe that with our massive infomercials, sir, — the ‘Ingat Buhay Pa Sa Hanap Buhay’ and the ‘Ingat, Angat Tayong Lahat’ of the business sector — [the figures] changed somehow,” he added.
This is certainly a better solution that partnering with ice cream manufacturers who cannot produce coolers with the requisite -80C temperature.President Rodrigo Duterte has bared that Russia wants to put up a pharmaceutical plant in the Philippines to manufacture vaccines against COVID-19.
Duterte said this was disclosed during the farewell call of outgoing Russian Ambassador to the Philippines Igor Khovaev on Monday.
“I just had a talk with the Ambassador of Russia, the outgoing, we had a serious one-on-one talk and he said that Russia is coming,” Duterte said in a pre-recorded speech.
(Maybe they’re just finishing something, they want to establish a pharmaceutical plant and their vaccine will also be made here.)
Russia had already vowed to prioritize the Philippines once they develop a vaccine against COVID-19.
It's a little strange to call these inconveniences sacrifices. They are inconveniences especially the face shields and the business sector has pointed this out to no avail.Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said the DOH understood the fatigue everyone was going through these days because of the restrictions put in place to control the spread of the virus. But people, she said, must also understand that they can no longer return to life as they knew it prior to the pandemic.
“That’s why we have the new normal. We have to remember that this new normal comes with little sacrifices like always wearing a mask, face shield, practicing distancing and washing hands,” Vergeire said.
“If all of us will cooperate and enforce compliance to these minimum health standards, hopefully this wouldn’t happen to us. We are gradually reopening the economy while balancing everything to prevent this kind of situation from happening in the country,” she said.
According to Darlene Cay’s report on “24 Oras” on Thursday, Rolando Eugenio, 54, has a budget of only a little over P100 daily for his family’s needs as he earns P3,500 monthly as a street sweeper in Barangay Immaculate Concepcion.
Rolando’s wife has passed away leaving him to take care of their children Roselyn, 10; Mark, 7; and Jeth, 6.
As the country transitioned to blended learning due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Rolando had been hands-on with his three children. However, it was also a challenge for him as they don’t have electricity and had to rely on the light from under the lamp post near their house.
“What I do during the day, I take them to my employer. They study online there, they helped me when my boss was free. 'When night comes, we are here, this is our situation,' Rolando said.
“It is very difficult. Sometimes I really owe my neighbors just to survive their daily food, ”he added.
Rolando said he does not have enough money to pay their electricity bill, more so a gadget and internet connection for his children.
"It's hard but there is a way if you are really determined," he said.
Rolando said poverty became a hindrance for him to finish his studies, but he said he won’t let the same thing happen to his children.
“That is necessary because when the day comes when they grow up, they are not as difficult in their lives as I was, I reached high school. For when they grow up, they are educated, ”he said.
His can-do spirit is very admirable but he should not have to resort to such lengths as studying under a lamppost. This is the kind of mess that needs fixing in the Philippines.
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| https://www.pna.gov.ph/articles/1118783 |
Malls and other business establishments may now hold sales and other marketing events to spur consumer activity amid the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) crisis, Malacañang said on Friday.“Ang mga establishments at mga malls may hold activities para magkaroon ng economic o business activity. Ito po ‘yung mga sales, pero subject po ito sa DTI guidelines in the operation of malls and shopping malls (Establishments and malls may hold activities to spur economic or business activity. These are sale events but they would still be subject to Department of Trade and Industry guidelines on the operation of malls and shopping malls),” Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said in a Laging Handa briefing.
Promotional events inside malls would be allowed in areas under general community quarantine (GCQ) and modified GCQ (MGCQ), Trade Secretary Ramon Lopez said.
“In yesterday’s (Thursday) IATF (meeting), IATF approved DTI’s proposal to allow again mall-wide sale to generate more economic activities,” Lopez said in a message to reporters, referring to the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases.
Police have launched a manhunt for the assailants in a drive-by shooting in the town of Buluan, Maguindanao province that killed three volunteers helping enforce quarantine rules on Thursday (Oct. 15).
Col. Donald Madamba, Maguindanao police chief, said the volunteers were seated in front of a roadside eatery at the village of Poblacion around 9 p.m. when a still undetermined number of men aboard a white car opened fire.
After the drive-by shooting, Madamba said the car sped off toward Tacurong City, some 15 kilometers from there the volunteers were attacked.
Two of the victims died on the spot while the third died in the hospital, Madamba said.
(Perhaps we can recommend to hospitals that while the utilization rate of our health facilities is at 50 percent, we can let our frontliners take a vacation so they can rest while the critical care capacity is not critical.)
“As long as there is a case remaining, people will still be needed to attend to them. Because there is a shortage of manpower, should their services be not needed to attend to COVID-19 cases, there are many other non-COVID-19 patients that they have to attend to,” Almora said in an interview on ANC.
Hospitals should also be prepared for possible intermittent surges in COVID-19 patients, he added.
“The way patients arrive, though it is true that there is a decreasing number of COVID-19 cases in the hospitals, the arrival of these cases is unpredictable. Pabugso-bugso (inconsistent), that’s why they need to be ready,” he said.
The regional chief of the Department of Health (DOH) here has observed that this city could be developing "herd immunity" from the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) as Central Visayas is seen to have flattened the epidemiological curve.DOH-7 regional director Dr. Jaime Bernadas on Wednesday cited the results from the surveillance testing using anti-body tests on the vendors at the Carbon Market, the city’s biggest wet market, recently conducted by the DOH and Cebu City Emergency Operations Center (EOC).
He disclosed that 47.48 percent of the 2,191 Carbon market vendors or 1,047 tested IgG positive. This indicates that they were asymptomatic and had already recovered from active infection of the virus.
“This is very significant because more and more people have now responded to the exposure of the virus, which means we are on the road to achieving ‘herd immunity,’” Bernadas said in a statement released by the Office of the Presidential Assistant for the Visayas after a virtual interview hosted by the latter.
Herd immunity can be achieved if 70 to 80 percent of the community has been exposed to the virus and developed immunity, he explained.
“Our Covid situation in Central Visayas and Cebu City has really improved a lot from being the hotspot to the better managed pandemic in the entire country, if not the best,” he said.
“It means we are already on the verge of going down to almost less than a thousand cases and on a downward trend, which is a welcome development. And hopefully, this trend continues,” Bernadas said.
THERE'S a bright side to being stuck at home. The global lockdowns spurred by the Covid-19 pandemic have given many people the rare opportunity to finish their personal projects.For a Pinoy game developer with zero programming experience, it was a videogame about the Vietnam War that took almost 20 years to complete.“I was always interested in history and the Vietnam War in particular,” said game developer Tiger Yan. “I started creating The ‘Nam: Vietnam Combat Operations way back in 2003 but work and life were more important, so the project was mothballed for 17 years. Like everyone else, the Covid-19 outbreak forced me to stay home most of 2020. I saw this as the perfect opportunity to learn basic programming and finally finish what I started.”Yan, who photographs people and animals in wild and rural areas around Asia, created the game as a free learning tool for people to experience commanding soldiers during the Vietnam War. He used his field experience investigating farm communities and wild areas to make the game as realistic as possible.“From irrigation dikes and rice paddies to barking dogs and crowing chickens, this game brings the Vietnamese countryside to life,” he said.According to the game’s Facebook page, players can command US Marines, Vietcong and North Vietnamese Army troops, plus the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN).
Sales of Negros Occidental’s gamefowl have dropped by 97 percent since the COVID-19 pandemic affected the province.
Dr. Renante Decena, provincial veterinarian, said the decrease in sales began in the first week of February and worsened as lockdowns were imposed.
“Unless government restrictions on cockfighting operations and movement are eased, the downward spiral that has also caused the loss of numerous jobs will continue,” he said.
Last year, about 15,000 to 20,000 gamefowls were shipped out of Negros Occidental every month.
At present, Decena said only 500 to 600 gamefowls are shipped out a month.
He said the gamefowl industry in Negros Occidental is valued at P5 billion as it involves not just the breeders but also the suppliers of feeds and other needs of fighting cocks.
Decena said the Negros Occidental provincial government used to earn P350,000 to P500,000 for gamefowl inspection fees and permits a month.
“Now, it is only about P12,500,” he said.
The Inter-Agency Task Force (AITF) for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases in its Resolution No. 79 on Thursday, October 15, 2020, has allowed the return of cockfighting and horse race betting operations in the country.
The resolution further stated the operation of licensed cockpits and the conduct of cockfighting shall be allowed in areas placed under modified general community quarantine or lower but still subject to strict observance of health and safety protocols and implementing guidelines as may be issued by the Department of Interior and local government.
It further added that in-person audience, online or remote betting, and live broadcasting/telecasting of cockfights shall not be permitted. The local government units shall have the final decision on whether such operation of licensed cockpits and conduct of cockfighting can proceed in their respective areas.
For Games and Amusement Board (GAB) Chairman Abraham Khalil "Baham" Mitra, he is happy and relieved that millions of people depending on horse racing and cockfighting will be allowed to go back to their livelihood again.
Based on GAB’s report, the gamefowl industry’s worth stands at P50 billion and is exhibiting growth more with the stoppage of the cockfighting activities due to Covid-19.
It has affected 30,000 breeders, 40 million gamefowl, and 14,000 poultry supply stores nationwide, and a sales drop in the feeds industry of 50 percent or equivalent to P15 billion, and P3 billion loss for veterinary products, vitamins and vaccines.
The industry also affected 700,000 employment that includes cockpit employees and workers, breeders and farmhands, informal sectors, poultry supply employees, licensed gaffers and feeds, and agri-vet company employees.
GAB has registered 1,200 cockpits nationwide on an average of 20 employees per cockpit for a total of 24,000.
Because of the pandemic, the government has lost around P2,406,260 from international derby that includes income from licenses issued (P942, 480); income from permits issued (P270,680); and income from derby assessment fee (P1,193,100).
Meanwhile, a total of P1,232,372,831.34 is the estimated government income loss because of the temporary halt of horse racing operations due to the pandemic.
