THE national government must immediately focus on containing the pandemic, as an overstretched health-care system straining under rising Covid and non-Covid cases would cause further disruption to the economy.
Action for Economic Reforms (AER) Coordinator Filomeno Sta. Ana III issued the statement in reaction to the pronouncement on Sunday of Acting Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Karl Kendrick T. Chua who said, “the issue we face now is not economy vs health. It is the total health of the people, whether from Covid, non-Covid sickness, or hunger.”
Sta. Ana said: “Secretary Karl [Chua] mentioned that we should be concerned with the ‘total health of the people.’ Everyone agrees with that. But we must likewise recognize that the non-Covid diseases are indirect consequences of the pandemic,” Sta. Ana told the BusinessMirror.
He said health workers are overstretched and health facilities are overburdened because of Covid-19. Patients could also postpone appointments and doctors could close their clinics, which could lead to a rise in other diseases.
The Department of Health (DOH) earlier said 29 hospitals in Metro Manila were already at “critical” level in terms of bed occupancy for Covid-19 patients. This meant that these hospitals had a Covid-19 occupancy rate of more than 85 percent.
“In short, the pandemic and total health of the people will be served. On the other hand, insisting on reopening the economy at a time that the virus is surging will only result in higher Covid and non-Covid cases, and will result in further economic disruption,” Sta. Ana said.
Sta. Ana said it is the government’s responsibility to provide relief to Filipinos. If there are millions who are hungry, he said, the government should give food and subsidies to these people and those who are vulnerable.
On Sunday, the Neda chief said 3.2 million people or 23 percent of Metro Manila residents are hungry.
Sta. Ana said the government can borrow funds for these given the country’s economic state. In 2020, the economy contracted 9.5 percent with the fourth quarter seeing a decline of 8.3 percent.
“It is most naive for the government to think that the market [when there is market failure] can provide the means for people to feed themselves,” Sta. Ana said.
“To say that there is no funding is wrong. For the government can borrow. Good economics allows heavy borrowing during a time of national emergency,” he added.
Chikiamco clarifies
Meanwhile, Foundation for Economic Freedom President Calixto V. Chikiamco clarified to BusinessMirror on Monday that it was the government who made their decisions “without science and data” and not the President’s economic team.
In a letter to the editor sent to BusinessMirror, Chikiamco said he blamed “the entire government, including the Department of Health [DOH] and other officials, not the economic managers for the situation we are facing now.”
Chikiamco said loosening restriction was the correct policy response. The only thing was that the government failed to manage this with the proper implementation of a testing, tracing, and treatment strategy.
He also said the mixed messaging coming from government officials who themselves violated health protocols contributed to the spike in Covid-19 cases.
“The failure to secure vaccines earlier has also pushed the government to resort to more restrictions as a response to the spike in cases,” Chikiamco said.
Careful and calibrated
On Monday, Chua said Neda supported the localized quarantine measures in areas showing high transmission rates, as directed by Resolution 104 of the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) on the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases.
The Neda chief said the relaxation of quarantine restrictions from April to October 2020 helped restore 6 million jobs.
Further, Chua said stricter compliance with health standards allowed for a safe reopening of the economy without causing a spike in cases in the last quarter of 2020, allowing more Filipinos to earn income and feed their families.
“We recognize the risks associated with the recent spike in Covid-19 cases but reverting back to a stricter and blanket community quarantine is no longer an option, knowing how much it has cost the Filipino people in the past year. That is why a careful and calibrated approach is needed to address the sources of highest risks through localized quarantines and additional restrictions, so that jobs or livelihoods will not be affected,” Chua said.
Chua said the country has been in varying levels of quarantine over the past year. As a result, an estimated 16.4 million people have experienced hunger nationwide. In NCR alone, 3.2 million individuals or 1 in 4 people are hungry. There are also 506,000 jobless people.
However, he said, the recent spike in cases compels the government to act swiftly to slow down the infection rate. The IATF recommended adding restrictions in specific areas without constraining the overall mobility of people.
“Over the next two weeks, we will strengthen the implementation of the ‘Prevent, Detect, Isolate, Treat, and Recover’ or PDITR strategy and continue rolling out the vaccination program,” Chua said.
“We have already started inoculating our medical frontliners last March 1, 2021 and we aim to provide vaccines to at least 70 million Filipinos this year, or around 100 percent of the entire adult population,” he added.
Over the weekend, economists said the President’s economic team may have miscalculated the situation when they recommended loosening mobility restriction in their bid to boost the economy.
On top of this, economists who spoke to the BusinessMirror said there were many issues in the implementation of the quarantine restrictions as well as the arrival of new Covid-19 variants which eventually caused the spike.
Over the weekend, the Department of Health (DOH) reported 15,756 new Covid-19 cases in the Philippines. This included the 7,999 recorded last Saturday and the 7,757 cases reported last Sunday.
On Monday, the DOH reported that another 8,019 new Covid-19 cases were reported. A total of 103 Filipinos recovered from the virus while four passed away.
“Government miscalculation is a generous description at this point—it presumes they are even attempting the math,” Ateneo de Manila University School of Government Dean Ronald U. Mendoza told the BusinessMirror in an interview last Sunday.
“All earlier indicators and forecasts suggested systems were still not ready even after a year of lockdown. They need the humility to ask the private sector and academia for help,” he added.
Sta. Ana earlier explained to the BusinessMirror that the efforts to loosen restrictions failed because the government was not effective in contact tracing and the referral system for Covid-19 patients was not functioning.
He added the following: government officials violated health protocols; the pronouncements from government officials provided a false sense of security encouraging more people to go out; and, the government lacked resources for relief or social amelioration.
Sta. Ana also noted a failure of coordination among national government agencies and between central government and local government units. Sta. Ana pointed as well to divisiveness among Filipinos, which eroded collective action.
Image credits: Nonie Reyes