Metro mayors recommend 14-day ECQ amid Delta threat

MANILA – The Metro Manila Council (MMC) is asking the national government to impose an enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) in the National Capital Region (NCR) due to rising cases of Covid-19 that could be driven by the highly-transmissible Delta variant.

In an online presser on Thursday, Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) chief Benjamin “Benhur” Abalos Jr. said the suggestion to the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-EID) was made after an emergency meeting on Wednesday evening.

“According to the projections made by the experts of the DOH (Department of Health), Delta [variant] is 60 percent more transmissible. If you’re going to go through the status quo, the same way we’re doing right now, we’re going to hit 11,000 cases [per day] by the end of September,” Abalos said.

Ideally, he said the MMC is recommending a 14-day ECQ to help stop the current rise in cases, provision of funds for a social amelioration program and a donation of 4 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine to be administered within the same time frame.

“What we have right now is about 7.5 million vaccinated, i-add mo ‘yung (add the) 4 million that’s about 11.5 million. Ang population ng (The population of) Metro Manila is about 14 million, approximately you’ll be having 41 percent of Metro Manila with two jabs. Siguro medyo laban laban na ‘yon, ‘yun ang importante rito (Maybe that will be enough, that’s what’s important),” Abalos said.

If imposing an ECQ is not possible due to budget constraints, he said there must be more restrictions placed on top of the heightened restrictions brought by the general community quarantine (GCQ) in the region.

“Alam naman natin na marami gastusin ang national government ngayon (We know that the national government is already spending a lot) because we could not do an ECQ without ‘ayuda’ or financial assistance especially to our poor brethren. Syempre mahirap, dalawang linggo wala kang trabaho (Of course that will be hard, you’ll have to stop working for two weeks). We must also consider that,” Abalos said.

Among possible additional restrictions, he said, is restricting indoor dining and reverting to dine-out or delivery for food establishments.

“This is very contagious, this is very aggressive, very infectious, puro (only) take-out. Let’s restrict mobility — GCQ with heightened restrictions, lagyan mo pa ng restrictions (let’s add more restrictions),” Abalos said.

For their part, he said the local governments of Metro Manila will be ramping up vaccinations, implement “aggressive” contact tracing, “massive” testing, and strict implementation of isolation.

“Hanggat maaari wala muna magho-home quarantine because this is highly infectious — sa mga nakikinig po baka lahat ng tao sa bahay ninyo mahawaan na lahat (As much as possible no one should be on home quarantine because this is highly infectious — for everyone listening, every person in your household might get infected),” Abalos said.

He said the MMC will present its recommendation to the IATF-EID on Thursday afternoon.

On Thursday, Malacañang announced that the National Capital Region and its four adjacent provinces — Laguna, Cavite, Bulacan and Rizal — will remain under GCQ with heightened restrictions status until August 15.