OCTA Research fellows: It may be prudent to extend MECQ in NCR Plus
Extending modified enhanced community quarantine in Metro Manila and four nearby provinces for about a week or two will be prudent to further curtail the spread of coronavirus disease, OCTA Research fellos said on Monday.
However, Professor Ranjit Rye said their group will support the government should it decide to place the National Capital Region and the provinces of Bulacan, Laguna, Cavite, and Rizal or the NCR Plus bubble to less restrictive general community quarantine after May 14.
"We will support whatever government decides. What we are suggesting is caution. What we're suggesting is calibrated, slow exit strategy so that we can sustain the trend," he said at the "Laging Handa" public briefing, noting that some members of the OCTA Research team favored the maintenance of MECQ while others preferred GCQ.
Rye cited that the government is still trying to fully roll out contact tracing and waiting for the result of the genome sequencing of the five individuals from India.
Butch Ong, a also OCTA Research fellow, in the same interview said that the hospital occupancy rate, especially the Intensive Care Unit, is still almost at critical level at around 69 percent. The critical level is 70 percent.
Ranjit said the positivity rate and daily new COVID-19 cases are still high and not at the level prior to the surge in March that prompted the government to implement a stricter quarantine classification in NCR Plus.
"This is why it might be prudent to consider an extension at this point. What we feel is important that the industries, while we decide to extend for a week or two, the industries that are closed down can slowly, in calibrated fashion be opened up," Rye said.
Rye, like Fr. Nicanor Austriaco, a molecular biologist and associate at the OCTA Research team, in the same public briefing, noted that while the NCR Plus has remained under MECQ, the situation of industries and mobility of the people are not similar to the MECQ in August 2021 as more industries are opened.
"The way here is a gradual exit from the quarantine so as not to reverse the trend...but we will support the government if it extends MECQ one or two weeks or go to GCQ but with stringent monitoring," he added.
Rye said the strict monitoring should not only be in public sector but in the private sector.
President Rodrigo Duterte, through the recommendation of the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases, is set to decide on or before May 14 the new quarantince classification in Metro Manila and nearby four provinces, which are currently under MECQ. Celerina Monte/DMS
