More news about how the COVID-19 pandemic in the Philippines is being handled by the public and the government.
Remember all the movies allocated to the indigent during the pandemic? Some of the beneficiaries of that money were ineligible.
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| https://www.gmanetwork.com/news/topstories/nation/871274/coa-p70m-in-covid-19-funds-went-to-ineligible-beneficiaries/story/ |
At least P70 million of the government’s COVID-19 response funds did not go to eligible beneficiaries, according to the Commission on Audit (COA).
This is stated under COA’s Performance Audit Report on the COVID-19 Adjustment Measures Program (CAMP), a government program which provided financial support to affected workers during the pandemic.
State auditors said that the P70.26 million CAMP fund was given to 14,052 beneficiaries of which 6,214 were "ineligible" while the 7,838 were "probably ineligible beneficiaries" because they already received financial assistance from other financial support programs of the government such as the Small Business Wage Subsidy Program by Social Security System (SSS) and Department of Social Welfare and Development’s Social Amelioration Program and their monthly gross salary were above the P40,000 threshold.
“Based on the interview, DOLE (Department of Labor and Employment) only relied on applicants’ self-declaration since there was no available and complete centralized database that would serve as a basis for determining whether an applicant already received financial assistance from other programs,” the COA said.
“In addition, only the DOLE, Department of Finance (DOF), and SSS were able to have a data sharing agreement on their beneficiaries,” the COA added.
State auditors cited that under the Implementing Guidelines of Bayanihan 2 Law, the subsidies or benefits received from existing financial assistance programs will be taken into consideration in the computation of the subsidy or benefit to be received to prevent double dipping or unauthorized receipt of multiple subsidies.
In addition, the CAMP-Bayanihan 2 guidelines issued by the DOLE provided a list that enumerates the exclusions from qualifying for the program to prevent the distribution of financial assistance to ineligible beneficiaries described in the Bayanihan 2 law.
COA also noted that the comparison of CAMP-Bayanihan 2 (beneficiaries information including SAP self-declaration) and SBWS data revealed that a total of 33 beneficiaries received financial assistance from three government programs, and that these 33 beneficiaries had received a total of P566,000 from CAMP-Bayanihan 2 and SBWS program.
COA also used the applicants’ self-declaration from CAMP-Bayanihan 2 data to identify whether the beneficiary received SAP. COA, however, could not determine if these 33 also received SAP due to lack of documents.
In response to COA’s findings, the DOLE Regional Offices in Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR) and Region 5 explained that the identified differences were due to timing issue when the applications were processed wherein, the list of beneficiaries from other financial assistance programs were still not available.
DOLE offices in Regions 5 and 7, for their part, argued that in some cases, beneficiaries misinterpreted the options provided and mistakenly ticked the checked box.
DOLE Region 5 also said that upon validation of data, a Demand Letter will be issued for the return of the financial assistance.
COA also said that the comparison of CAMP Bayanihan 2 and SBWS data also showed that 6,181 received CAMP Bayanihan 2 financial assistance amounting to P104.61 million, and that 52 of the 6,181 beneficiaries received both CAMP-Bayanihan 2 and SBWS aid.
The 52 returned their subsidies/financial assistance to Social Security System ranging from P5,000-P17,117, totaling P472,153.
“In our analysis and the result of interview, we noted that approval of the ineligible beneficiaries (also recipients of SBWS Program) was due to : a) manual cross matching of FO evaluators on the list of SBWS beneficiaries; b) delayed provision of the list; c) lack of awareness of some DOLE regional and field office evaluators on the list of SBWS Program beneficiaries provided by SSS; and d) voluminous applications received and evaluated,” COA said.
In the same COA report, DOLE told state auditors that it will maximize efforts to generate a clean list of beneficiaries which have been cross-checked with recipients of other financial assistance programs to ensure the detection of multiple/duplicate applications before they will be processed for approval.
The DOLE says letters will be sent out demanding any ineligible payments returned. Surely they must know that money is all gone now?
Daily COVID cases have once more breached the 2,000 threshold.
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| https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/1775655/daily-covid-19-infections-back-to-2000-cases-anew |
The COVID-19 caseload went back to the 2,000 level after five days, based on the COVID-19 Tracker of the Department of Health (DOH).
On Friday, the country logged 2,001 new infections, slightly up from the 1,854 cases recorded the previous day. Daily cases had hovered around the 1,000 level for five straight days since Sunday last week.
This pushed the active COVID-19 cases to 16,314 and the total case tally to 4,131,790.
No new deaths were reported last week. The country’s death toll has reached 66,466 since the pandemic began three years ago.
Seventeen more cases of Omicron XBB.1.16, the latest COVID-19 variant to enter the country, had been reported in the latest biosurveillance report for the period May 15 to May 19. This brought the total cases of the highly transmissible strain to 28.
The DOH reminded the public to continue to use layers of protection against COVID-19 based on one’s risk to the virus as it blamed increased mobility for the gradual rise in infections.
“It is also important to note that there are many factors that can be attributed to an increase in cases,” the DOH said in a statement.
“However, as we have lowered our restrictions, individuals are now more mobile to which we may attribute our case increase,” it added.
It's funny how the DOH continues to blame infections on "increased mobility." It's like they want the lockdowns back in place. This number sounds bad but taken as a whole infections are DOWN.
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| https://mb.com.ph/2023/5/29/doh-posts-11-667-new-covid-19-cases |
The Department of Health (DOH) on Monday, May 29, said 11,667 new Covid-19 cases have been recorded in the past week.
In its bulletin issued Monday, DOH said the average number of new Covid-19 cases in the past week is 1,667 — a figure that is six percent lower compared to the tally recorded from May 15 until May 21.
Of the new cases, 105 are severe and critical. Meanwhile, no deaths were recorded from May 15 to 28.
“We are reminding everyone not to be complacent about the threat of Covid-19. Rather, we must continue to properly comply with minimum public health standards under Alert Level 1,” said DOH.
Even Metro Manila has seen a drop in cases.
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| https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/1776716/covid-19-positivity-rate-drops-further-in-metro-manila |
Metro Manila’s COVID-19 positivity rate decreased to 21 percent in the week ending May 28, 2023, down from 25 percent the previous week, Octa Research fellow Guido David said on Tuesday.
“The reproduction number decreased to 0.97 or less than 1 as of May 26,” he said on Twitter.
However, hospital occupancy went up slightly from 28 to 29 percent.
As infections decline in Metro Manila, spikes emerge in several Luzon provinces, with 10 out of 18 monitored areas continuing to surge, David said.
A significant increase occurred in Oriental Mindoro, where the positivity rate leaped from 33 percent to 55 percent between May 26 and May 27, 2023.
Major increases in percentages were observed in Bataan (21 to 38 percent), Tarlac (15 to 21 percent), and Cagayan (21 to 27 percent, while notable declines were seen in Isabela (67 to 46 percent), Laguna (35 to 29 percent), and Batangas (36 to 30 percent).
“Positivity rates decreased in Batangas, Bulacan, Camarines Sur, Cavite, Isabela, Laguna, Rizal and Zambales. Positivity rates remained high in most of Luzon,” David observed.
There are increases and decreases around the nation but overall the DOH says the trend has been downward.
The Bishop of Bulacan has ended the dispensation allowing Catholics to stay home for Holy Mass. Now they must attend Church once more.
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| https://mb.com.ph/2023/5/30/bulacan-bishop-invites-catholic-members-to-attend-holy-mass |
Bulacan Bishop Dennis Villarojo will end the dispensation given to the Catholic faithful from attending Sunday masses starting June 11, 2023, and urged them to physically attend to their Sunday obligation in churches and parishes.
Villarojo said the obligation of Catholics to attend Mass, which was suspended in March 2020 due to the pandemic, will be reinstated and will take effect on June 11, the Solemnity of the Corpus Christi.
“At the conclusion of the pandemic that compelled limited opportunities to worship in person… we are hereby lifting the dispensation given to the faithful from personally participating in the Mass due to civil restrictions imposed on account of the Covid-19 pandemic,” Villarojo stated.
Exceptions in the form of particular dispensations are given to those who are sick, have fragile health, or are susceptible to contracting illnesses.
“Except for those (who are) sick and have serious reasons, all Catholics are expected to perform their obligations to physically attend Masses in churches,” the bishop said.
Villarojo also encouraged the parishes, chaplaincies, and Catholic schools to “employ all effective means necessary to catechize the faithful… on the importance of the Sunday obligation.”
“Let us ardently encourage the faithful to encounter God through the Church in her communal celebration of the Sacred Mysteries,” Villarojo added.
The diocese early this year ordered the parishes to limit the live streaming of Masses on Sundays to at least two, preferably one in the morning and one in the evening.
How different things could have been had the Church resisted the unlawful power of the State to prevent them from worshipping.
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