INTERIOR Secretary Eduardo Año yesterday said Metro Manila mayors are amenable to a downgrade of the region’s current modified enhanced community quarantine (MECQ) classification to the more relaxed general community quarantine (GCQ) starting Saturday.
But Año said the downgrade would still be with “very strict restrictions.”
“They (mayors) have yet to reach a consensus, a common position, but they are amenable to de-escalating the quarantine (classification) but with very strict, with very high restrictions,” Año said in a phone interview.
Año said local executives of Metro Manila held a consultation meeting on Wednesday night and discussed the next community quarantine classification for the National Capital Region.
The group has yet to reach an official common position on the issue.
Año said Metropolitan Manila Development Authority chairman Benhur Abalos was tasked to consolidate the positions of the mayors and present it to the Inter-agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging and Infectious Diseases (IATF) and President Duterte last night.
Pressed if the mayors were amenable to a GCQ, Año said: “They are open to the option because they are seeing, even our economic team, that our economy is negatively affected, people are losing their jobs.”
He likewise noted improvements in the COVID-19 situation, with the daily number of cases in the NCR showing a downtrend.
Presidential spokesman Harry Roque reiterated the IATF recommendation will be based on the general attack rate, two-week average attack rate and healthcare utilization rate.
Roque said that with the lower number of COVID-19 cases and improving healthcare capacity system in Metro Manila and the provinces of Bulacan, Cavite, Laguna and Rizal, or the NCR Plus, the IATF is leaning towards the gradual opening of the economy.
The NCR Plus is under MECQ until today. It was placed under strict enhanced community quarantine from March 29 to April 11 following a surge in COVID-19 cases in late March that saw the hospital care system go into critical level.
Health Secretary Francisco Duque said that despite the downward trend in recent weeks, the Department of Health (DOH) is working to further bring down the number to pre-surge numbers in January and February.
Speaking at the ceremonial immunization program at the Makati Medical Center, Duque said: “The goal is to bring it down to lower than 2,000 cases per day. It was the pre-surge number. In the NCR, we want it brought down to less than 500. That was the pre-surge number from January to February.”
Last week, the DOH said the national seven-day moving average was at 6,000 cases. In Metro Manila, the latest seven-day moving average is at 1,930 cases.
The health chief said he is confident that the country can attain such a goal.
“We can do it. The protection of the minimum public health standards is anywhere from 95 to 99 percent. We need to just do this,” he said, adding: “We have already done this during the August 2020 surge. That’s the proof. And we can do it again.” — With Jocelyn Montemayor and Gerard Naval
