By Dolly Yasa
BACOLOD City – If he will have his way, Negros Occidental Governor Eugenio Jose Lacson said he will extend the General Community Quarantine in the province for another 15 days.
The GCQ in Negros Occidental which aims to contain the spread of the coronavirus 2019 or COVID-19 is set to end on May 15, 2020.
While it is considered more relaxed than the Enhanced Community Quarantine, the GCQ still imposes rules such as physical distancing and mandatory wearing of masks in public.
“I don’t think we are that ready to just open up to everybody and allow everybody to just go out. I think a GCQ is a perfect quarantine model for now,” Lacson said.
Lacson said he will ask the national Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases if the GCQ can be extended in the province.
“Personally, I am for an extension of the GCQ. But what will happen after May 15 will depend on the guidelines issued by the IATF,” Lacson told reporters here.
Lacson said that for now all persons coming into the province are placed under 14-day quarantine as a precaution against COVID-19.
Lacson also said that there will be more trips for Overseas Filipino Workers asking to be repatriated to the province by plane as the Malasakit sea trips have been stopped for now.
He also said that people will have to adjust to the “new normal” because “COVID -19 will not go away, even if we flatten the curve it does not mean we are eradicating it.”
Lacson said the new normal is here to stay until a vaccine is found to protect people from COVID-19.
The new normal also means people will have to continue wearing face masks, practicing social distancing, carrying alcohol and frequent hand washing.
“We will really have to just get used to that,” he said.
