The World Health Organization (WHO) on Thursday urged the Philippines to speed up its vaccination of seniors before the more transmissible Delta variant of the coronavirus becomes dominant, warning that failure to do so could mean more deaths among the elderly.
The warning came as the government is considering a travel ban on Indonesia, which has detected the Delta variant and is experiencing a surge in COVID-19 cases.
As of June 29, only 8.5 percent of the 8.2 million senior citizens have been fully vaccinated, while 28 percent have received their first dose, said Dr. Rabindra Abeyasinghe, WHO representative to the Philippines.
Citing government data, Abeyasinghe said elderly patients made up 60 percent of COVID-19 deaths in the Philippines.
“We have no guarantee that we can indefinitely hold the Delta variant out… How long we can hold this is a matter of time…We have a unique window,” he said.
“Before that happens, we need to try to vaccinate as many of our senior citizens as possible. If we fail to do that, it is likely that we are going to see a lot of deaths happening among the senior citizenry,” he added.
Health Secretary Francisco Duque III, meanwhile, said experts are studying a possible ban on travelers from Indonesia over the threat of the Delta variant that first emerged in India.
The government extended until July 15 a temporary ban on travelers from seven countries: the United Arab Emirates, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Oman, Nepal, and Bangladesh due to the Delta variant.
A former government advisor, Dr. Tony Leachon had urged authorities to extend the ban to Indonesia.
Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said, however, that tightening border controls is better than expanding the travel ban because the Delta variant has already been detected in over 90 countries.
On the other hand, Duque said the government’s list of “green countries” or nations whose citizens can undergo a shorter quarantine period upon arrival in the Philippines, is “dynamic” and will still be expanded.
Duque said the United States was not included in the initial list despite its high vaccination rate due to the transmission of the Delta variant there, which now accounts for 30 percent of its reported cases.
“We have to be very careful. It’s easy to relax. That’s the easiest thing to do, it’s the sweetest thing to do. But the challenge is to keep off those variants from entering our communities,” Duque added.
The Philippines has detected 17 cases of the Delta variant as of June 17, and all were from Filipinos returning from overseas.
In Indonesia, President Joko Widodo said his government would impose emergency restrictions to battle an alarming surge in COVID-19 infections and to avoid a collapse of its health care system.
Widodo said the new restrictions, starting Friday, would last more than two weeks in the capital Jakarta and across hard-hit Java, as well as on the holiday island Bali, after infections surged to record levels.
New daily cases are topping 21,000 per day in Southeast Asia’s worst-hit nation, and authorities have warned about the spread of highly infectious variants.
“This situation has forced us to take stricter steps… I have decided to impose emergency restrictions,” Widodo said in a nationwide address Thursday.
Widodo, better known as Jokowi, did not give details of the measures, which would end July 20.
But a document from senior minister Luhut Pandjaitan’s office said they include ordering all non-essential employees to work from home, while classes would only be held online.
Shopping malls and mosques across the Muslim-majority country would also be shuttered in a bid to bring new daily cases to below 10,000, it said.
Elsewhere in the world:
* The Bangladesh army and police patrolled empty streets on Thursday as a strict week-long COVID-19 lockdown began, with people confined to their homes except for emergencies and to buy essentials. The government has said the South Asian nation of 168 million people is seeing an “alarming and dangerous” rise in cases, blamed largely on the highly infectious Delta variant. Hospitals are struggling, particularly in areas bordering India where the strain was first detected. Some rural towns have recorded infection rates of 70 percent.
* An EU-wide Covid certificate for easier travel comes into force on Thursday, just in time for Europe’s busy summer vacation period, but the more-infectious Delta variant is already threatening to curtail its use. The EU document — essentially a QR code made available in digital form on smart phones or hard copy — shows whether the bearer is vaccinated with one of the EU’s approved jabs (from BioNTech/Pfizer, AstraZeneca, Moderna or Johnson & Johnson), has recovered from an infection, or has a recent negative COVID test. Under EU law, the certificate is meant to do away with the need for quarantines or further testing when traveling between the EU’s 27 countries or four associated European nations (Iceland, Norway, Switzerland and Liechtenstein).
* Britain’s startling rise in Delta infections — it now has a rolling two-week infection rate more than seven times that of the EU — is generating deep concern on the continent. At an EU summit last week, German Chancellor Angela Merkel criticized southern EU countries — desperate for tourist cash — for allowing in Britons with few, if any, COVID checks. This week, Portugal, Spain and Malta all abruptly increased restrictions for travelers from Britain, emphasizing full vaccination for entry. With AFP