By Dolly Yasa
BACOLOD City – 1,786 public market vendors from three major public markets here joined the Surveillance Testing project of the city government on Saturday.
Vice Mayor El Cid Familiaran, head of the local Inter-Agency Task Force against the coronavirus disease 2019 or COVID-19, told Daily Guardian Sunday that vendors who will test positive will be extracted and isolated and contact tracing will then follow.
Mayor Evelio Leonardia thanked the public market vendors “who willingly had themselves swabbed under the Surveillance Testing project of the City through our Emergency Operations Center, under the guidance of IATF-Visayas chief implementer Major General (Retired) Mel Feliciano.”
He said “the numbers say it all.”
The mayor further said that “more of our people are now aware of the necessity of the testing in our fight against COVID-19 and they realize that such will redound to their personal benefit as well as that of their families and the public in general.”
But he lamented that there are still people who exploit the situation for their political agenda.
“These people sow misinformation and resort to black propaganda to confuse and mislead the public. This will bring us nowhere in this crisis. We appeal to all those politicking to set aside their agenda meanwhile. Let us handle this COVID-19 crisis united as a people. It is when we are united that we can have a better chance of containing the virus and leading our people out of this pandemic. Politics will have its own time someday. But let it wait meanwhile if we care for the welfare of our people.”
Earlier, some of the vendors from the Burgos and Libertad markets staged a noise barrage in protest of the surveillance testing.
But their leaders later signed a manifesto in support of the testing.
