By Joseph B.A. Marzan
President Rodrigo Duterte announced on Monday evening that Iloilo City would remain under General Community Quarantine (GCQ) for the whole month of January, but Mayor Jerry Treñas said the city may possibly slide to the “more permissive” Modified GCQ.
Other areas that will remain under GCQ are Metro Manila, Batangas province, Davao City, Davao del Norte, Iligan, Isabela, Lanao del Sur, Santiago City, and Tacloban City.
This was due to the prevalence of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in these areas.
Initially, Duterte said “Iloilo” which caused slight confusion if he referred to the city or the province, which are administered separately by their respective local governments.
Presidential spokesperson Herminio Roque later clarified that the president was referring to Iloilo City.
Treñas confirmed in a press conference on Tuesday that he had appealed the city’s classification with Interior Secretary Eduardo Año.
The mayor said Año was optimistic that the appeal will be granted despite having no official response yet from Malacañang.
Mayor Treñas said the positive response is because of the downtrend in new cases in the city in the past two months.
On Dec. 28, only 7 new confirmed COVID-19 cases were reported by the city’s Emergency Operations Center, and as of 12 noon of Dec. 29, there has only been 1 new case.
“Officially, I haven’t received anything, but you know, up to 1 a.m. in the morning, I have been texting with Secretary Año. He said he did not see any problem because Iloilo City has improved a lot. Compared to October and November, our cases went down,” Treñas said in a press conference.
VACCINE DEVELOPMENTS
Treñas was also upbeat on the city’s COVID-19 vaccination drive for 2021.
City officials virtually met with the national government’s COVID-19 vaccine czar Carlito Galvez, the Chief Implementer of the National Task Force to end COVID-19.
For cities with budget for the vaccine, the national government’s target is 100 percent “inoculation”, which is another term for vaccination.
The mayor said Galvez expressed appreciation for the city government’s vaccination efforts.
Treñas in early December announced that P100 million will be allocated to acquire vaccines.
The mayor also announced that for companies who wished to buy vaccines to be administered to their workers, there must be a tripartite agreement between the company, the national Inter-Agency Task Force on the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-MEID) via Galvez, and the vaccine maker.
Workers who reside outside the city may also be able to receive the vaccine according to the mayor, as he said that this may be key to the “100 percent inoculation” goal.
He also clarified that once the vaccines will be available, administration will be on a voluntary basis and no one will be forced.
“We will not be forcing anyone. For those who do not wish to [vaccinate] for one reason or another, they are scared, they have religious reasons, or other reasons, we will not be forcing them because this is going to be voluntary,” Treñas said.
The mayor also expressed optimism on the possibility that the city may be able to vaccinate all of its residents by the end of 2021.
He said that if the city’s COVID-19 Team of doctors would be okay with the Chinese Sinovac and Russian Sputnik vaccines, they may be able to finish.
Galvez previously stated in a presser that these vaccines will be the first to be approved and introduced to the country within the first quarter of 2021.
If the team does not approve, the city will buy the British AstraZeneca vaccine, which is seen to be locally available by the second quarter of next year.
“My view on the schedule given, by 2021 we may be able to finish. But it would depend on our doctors saying they would be okay on the Chinese and Russian vaccines, maybe on the first quarter. If they are not okay, we will go for the AstraZeneca if we can have us listed already,” said the mayor.
