MANILA – The city and province of Iloilo would still be under the strictest enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) for the first seven days of August as recommended by the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-MEID) and approved by President Rodrigo Duterte.
Iloilo city and province were placed under ECQ on July 16 following the discovery in Pandan, Antique of two cases of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by the Delta variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
“Kaya nilalagay ang (Iloilo) sa ECQ dapat mapabagal ang pagkalat ng sakit nang mapaghandaan ang mga pangangailangan ng mga magiging seryoso ang karamdaman,” said Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque during President Duterte’s pre-recorded televised address to the nation late night on Wednesday.
“Ang basehan natin ay average daily attack rate, two-week growth rate na parehong kritikal sa Iloilo. Maski karamihan ng pasyente ay galing sa labas, ang healthcare utilization rate ay factually, objectively measured,” he added.
Antique, Bacolod City, Aklan, and Capiz, meanwhile, will remain under general community quarantine (GCQ) with heightened restrictions for the first 15 days of August.
Negros Occidental and Guimaras, for their part, would also keep their GCQ status for the entire month of August.
‘PEOPLE ARE HUNGRY’
Earlier, Iloilo City’s Mayor Jerry Treñas lamented the effects of the ECQ.
“Many are already complaining that they are hungry and they can no longer feed their families,” the city mayor said.
Treñas noted that while COVID-19 cases in Iloilo City were starting to go down, the parameters being looked upon by the IATF were still high.
He said the city’s COVID beds and Intensive Care Unit (ICU) beds utilization rates are still high since patients coming from the provinces of Antique, Aklan, Capiz, Iloilo, and Guimaras are being brought to hospitals here. Cases also continue to go up in these provinces.
Nevertheless, Treñas stressed that the city is doing very well in contact tracing and has the highest reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) tests in the whole region.
Also, he said, houses with many positive cases were placed on lockdown while the city prepared quarantine facilities for positive patients.
Meanwhile, Treñas said the P1,000 cash assistance to be given by the government through the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) will help, but unfortunately, it won’t be enough.
From July 1 to 26 this year, the city logged 2,346 cases with 90 daily average cases. This is 15.25 percent lower compared to the 2,768 cases recorded in the same period last month with 106 daily average cases.
Meanwhile, based on the Department of Health in Region 6 latest data, Iloilo City had 1,440 active cases, 11,662 total recoveries, and 363 COVID deaths./PN