SEVERAL senators are supporting the appeal of medical professional groups for a two-week break by placing Mega Manila under a two-week enhanced community quarantine (ECQ).
The initial expression of support came from Sens. Richard Gordon, Panfilo Lacson, Pia Cayetano and Nancy Binay in separate statements. However, they also sought a thorough study of the ECQ option, noting that more localized lockdowns, alongside other aggressive measures, might be the key.
In a statement, Cayetano noted that the medical communities said, “Throughout the pandemic, they truly have been carrying a heavy burden.” She acknowledged, though, that “on the other hand, the Inter-Agency Task Force [IATF] has the difficult task of finding the right balance between opening the economy for job creation and restricting movement to stop the spread.”
She welcomed the IATF’s response to President Duterte’s directive to study well the medical professionals’ appeal, aired in a press conference on Saturday led by the Philippine College of Physicians, and including leaders from the nursing, medical technologists and other health workers’ sectors.
Prodding government to consider the medical frontliners’ plight in imposing quarantine levels, Gordon noted the roughly 100,000 positive Covid-19 cases recorded as of the weekend, a fact that makes it easy to see why “doctors [are] already calling for a breather for exhausted frontliners.”
Gordon, chairman and CEO of the Philippine Red Cross, said there was need to consider well the medical frontliners’ plight in deciding the imposition of quarantine levels.
The doctors’ plea focused on Mega Manila—National Capital Region, Calabarzon and Central Luzon—as the fastest community transmissions have been listed there.
Gordon said that in Red Cross, “our medtechs also got infected with Covid. We must study well their suggestions, some are very meritorious, on the need to give our doctors pause.” He added that “even our isolation facilities now are overflowing, that’s the problem.”
‘Master plan’
Gordon affirmed the need to “come up with a master plan” in the fight against the pandemic, particularly on the protection of medical frontliners.
“To me life is more important and it’s hard for us to lose our doctors. Let’s consider their plea and study it well.”
Gordon noted PCP’s Vice President Dr. Maricar Limpin saying a breather was urgent for exhausted medical frontliners, as cases started to rise after the ECQ was relaxed into the modified community quarantine. She added that aside from physical exhaustion, many hospital workers are also experiencing depression.
Last week, President Duterte retained the general community quarantine (GCQ) over Metro Manila until August 15.