Placing all regions under the most lenient Alert Level 1 status will push the country toward full economic recovery, National Task Force Against COVID-19 chief Secretary Carlito Galvez Jr. said Tuesday.
He said inoculation remained the key to achieve the goal as he urged participation in the fourth “Bayanihan, Bakunahan” national vaccination drive this weekend.
“We have to expand the Alert Level 1 nationwide so that we could achieve full recovery and all of our establishments will operate 100 percent with their workforce at full capacity alignment,” said Galvez, also the vaccine czar, during a vaccination activity at a business process outsourcing company in Makati City.
Meanwhile, Duque said Tuesday it was not yet time to de-escalate the whole Philippines to Alert Level 1 as there were several areas that have yet to reach the metrics set by the Inter-Agency Task Force.
Duque’s comment was made following the proposal of the National Economic Development Authority on Monday to shift the entire country to Alert Level 1 and to open schools for face-to-face classes “to increase domestic economy and offset global risk.”
Galvez said fully vaccinated individuals must avail themselves of booster shots, too, to maximize protection against severe effects of COVID-19.
“Considering now that we are under Alert Level 1, we have to protect our economic front-liners and their families,” Galvez said, referring to the National Capital Region and 38 other areas.
Aside from ramping up administration of booster doses, the government aims to hit 70 million fully vaccinated Filipinos by the end of March and 90 million by June 30.
“Vaccination sites are now saturated so we have to bring the vaccines to the people by all means, in their houses or in workplaces,” Galvez said.
Citing the earlier report of Health Secretary Francisco Duque III, Galvez said the country is currently at “minimum health risk”.
The Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases will meet again Thursday to discuss the shift to Alert Level 1 in more areas.
“We will look into the recommendation of the economic sector,” he added. “Hopefully, we can go back to the new normal.”
The Philippines has so far administered 136,163,623 doses of COVID-19 vaccines, with 63,789,508 already fully vaccinated with either two doses or the single-shot Janssen and Sputnik Light jabs.
A total 10,616,335 have their booster shots.
The country’s average daily vaccination rate in the past seven days stood at 147,007 jabs.
As of Monday night, after the arrival of 1,167,660 doses of the Pfizer jab, the country has already received 232,673,310 doses.
Duque said in an interview with Dobol B TV: “Not now. We don’t want to lose what we have already won. We need to be careful. I’m sorry because my principle in life is to always be more prudent and more conservative.”
Duque explained that easing the country to Alert Level 1 was still the goal, but all areas have to first meet the revised parameters for the de-escalation to the lowest level under the new alert level system.
Former presidential spokesperson and IATF co-chair Karlo Nograles previously noted that areas would only be de-escalated to Alert Level 1 upon meeting all the criteria:
–low to minimal risk case classification
–total bed utilization rate of less than 50 percent
–full vaccination of 70 percent of its target population (denominator is 80 percent of its total population)
–full vaccination of 80 percent of its Priority Group A2 (senior citizens) or target population (denominator is 85 percent of A2 population).
Currently, only the National Capital Region and 38 more areas in different parts of the country are under Alert Level 1 from March 1 to March 15.
Under Alert Level 1, intrazonal and interzonal travel shall be allowed without regard to age and comorbidities.
All establishments, persons, or activities are allowed to operate, work, or be undertaken at full on-site or venue/seating capacity provided it is consistent with minimum public health standards.
In related developments, law enforcers saw a significant increase in the volume of illegal drugs seized in operations during the past week amid increased mobility in many areas under the most relaxed Alert Level 1.
Speaking to President Rodrigo Duterte during his Talk to the People on Monday night, Department of the Interior and Local Government Secretary Eduardo Año said authorities seized a total of P424.7 million from February 27 to March 5, from only P159 million seized from the previous seven-day period from February 20 to 26.
“This is probably due to the easing of restrictions which resulted in increased mobility. Illegal drug traders took advantage of the situation. We will intensify our operations to make sure that they
will not be able to go on with their activities while we see eased restrictions and decrease in cases under Alert Level 1),” he added.
In the same period, the DILG chief reported that 1,307 drug suspects were nabbed in the 916 operations.
A total 76 drug personalities personally surrendered while one death was recorded during the police operations.
The confiscated illegal drugs in the weeklong operation included 7.5 kilos of shabu, 3,114.2 kilos of marijuana, 1 gram of cocaine, and 1.2 grams of ecstasy.
Following the implementation of Alert Level 1 in many areas, Año noted that the number of granular lockdown areas across the country has dropped to 37.
Out of this number, 31 are in the Cordillera Administrative Region, four are in Ilocos Region and two are in Metro Manila.
On health protocol violations, 33,143 persons were warned, 7,596 were fined, 2,640 were subjected to community service, 10 were brought to inquest proceedings and 1,132 others were arrested and charged for not wearing face masks.
The DILG chief also noted that the number of mass-gathering violators increased by 57.85 percent with 350 persons warned and two others fined.
He noted that 14,800 individuals were reprimanded, 393 were fined or cited and 1,306 underwent community service for violating the physical distancing rule with the incidents rising by 29.14 percent.