National Security Adviser Hermogenes Esperon, Jr. has commended the Makati City government for what he called “its effective response program against the coronavirus disease.”
Esperon said the national government, particularly the Inter-Agency Task Force on Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF), could learn from the city’s best practices in fighting COVID-19.
“The IATF can learn from Makati’s best practices, and these can be passed on to other cities. In turn, we may also make some more recommendations to improve what is already there. This is my role. I am here to bridge the national and local governments. Rest assured, we only want what is good for Makati,” said Esperon, following a meeting with Mayor Abigail Binay.
Binay, for her part, said Makati was looking forward to working closely with the national government in fighting the pandemic. She said the city was grateful that Esperon was assigned as the city’s “Big Brother.”
“We are looking forward to working with the national government for our policies in containing the virus in the city,” said Binay as she underscored the city’s plans to use the Stay Safe Application to expand the city’s contact tracing efforts.
Binay also thanked Esperon for turning over donations of Linhuan Qinjuen Jiaonang, a drug that had been proven to speed up recovery and reduce the symptoms of COVID-positive patients.
The city received a total of 10 boxes of the medicine, which could benefit 1,400 patients.
“We are grateful for these donations,” Binay said, emphasizing that the medicine would be distributed under strict medical protocols, and not randomly.
The city chief executive also apprised Esperon of Makati’s free pneumonia and influenza vaccine program for residents, employees, and frontliners to boost their immune system and improve their overall health during the pandemic.
The city government recently launched its Pooled RT-PCR Testing for COVID-19 following an agreement with the Philippine Children’s Medical Center (PCMC), the Philippine Center for Entrepreneurship, and the BDO Foundation.
The city government is co-funding the project which was developed under Project ARK, a private sector-led initiative to make mass testing available nationwide.
Under the pooled testing method, swab samples of multiple individuals are tested at the same time.
If the result is positive, all the individuals in the pool will be tested separately. If the test comes back negative, there is no need to test everyone in the batch.
Binay emphasized that the result of the pilot test will be shared with other local government units to help them improve their own COVID-19 protocols.
At the end of the one-month test period, Makati is expected to come up with a pooled testing protocol which will enable the city and other institutions to optimize the availability of test kits, reduce the workload on testing laboratory staff, identify and isolate large groups of negative cases which will make testing more cost-effective and provide LGUs and businesses better and clearer direction for decision-making.
The mayor pointed out that the city has remained consistent in using RT-PCR testing, considered the “gold standard” by health experts.
“We recognize that accuracy and reliability are more important than lower cost and convenience.”