{"id":271787,"date":"2020-10-14T06:25:15","date_gmt":"2020-10-14T10:25:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=271787"},"modified":"2020-10-14T06:25:15","modified_gmt":"2020-10-14T10:25:15","slug":"prrd-should-decide-on-quarantine-levels-without-public-pressure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2020\/10\/14\/prrd-should-decide-on-quarantine-levels-without-public-pressure\/","title":{"rendered":"PRRD should decide on quarantine levels without public pressure"},"content":{"rendered":"
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He acknowledged that the Palace could not stop the research team from publicizing recommendations, but explained that this move would immediately generate public opinion. (PNA photo by Joey O. Razon)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

MANILA<\/strong>\u00a0\u2013 President Rodrigo Duterte should decide on quarantine classifications without \u201cpressure\u201d from the public, Malaca\u00f1ang said Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque reiterated his appeal to the OCTA Research team\u00a0not to publicize their recommendations on quarantine levels<\/a>, saying Duterte could make better decisions without influence from any person or group.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy is it important that these recommendations not be made public? Because it will enable the President to make the correct decision even if it may be an unpopular decision,\u201d Roque said in an interview over CNN Philippines\u2019 The Source.<\/p>\n

Because the President had the difficult job of balancing health and the economy, Roque said it was important to give him \u201cleeway\u201d to decide on quarantine classifications.<\/p>\n

\u201cHealth consideration is very important but as you know we\u2019re now at the point where we\u2019re not talking about the economy, we\u2019re talking about people going hungry, people being malnourished because of the lack of income,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He acknowledged that the Palace could not stop the research team from publicizing recommendations, but explained that this move would immediately generate public opinion.<\/p>\n

\u201cAny recommendation publicly made tends to either influence the President because there would be public opinion generated by the recommendation and we want the President to make the right decision without pressure from the public,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

According to Roque, the research team must allow the President to make decisions pursuant to the national interest.<\/p>\n

\u201cLet the political leader decide pursuant to what he thinks is best for the country. I think that is number one, a good way of deferring to the wishes of the people who elected the President to make these kinds of decisions in the first place,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Roque, meanwhile, clarified that he appreciated the public service being carried out by the research team.<\/p>\n

\u201cI appreciate very much the help being extended by OCTA. They basically verify the figures that we already have within the [Department of Health] and within the [Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases],\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

On Monday, Duterte\u2019s Cabinet approved the recommendation to consider the escalation of quarantine levels only as a last resort.<\/p>\n

Roque pointed out that the IATF decides on quarantine classifications for highly-urbanized cities, but leaves it to local governments to decide on classifications of municipalities.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe already have a system in the IATF that unless you\u2019re a highly-urbanized city, the classification is decided upon by the provincial governor and the regional IATF,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The OCTA Research team earlier asked the government to reimpose a stricter quarantine classification or implement localized lockdowns in Bauan in Batangas, Calbayog in Western Samar, and General Trias in Cavite.<\/p>\n

Currently, Lanao del Sur province and the cities of Bacolod, Iligan, and Iloilo are also under modified enhanced community quarantine until the end of the month.<\/p>\n

Metro Manila and the provinces of Bulacan, Batangas, and the city of Tacloban are under general community quarantine.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MANILA\u00a0\u2013 President Rodrigo Duterte should decide on quarantine classifications without \u201cpressure\u201d from the public, Malaca\u00f1ang said Wednesday. Presidential Spokesperson Harry …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":265787,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,95],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-271787","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-news-ph","mauthors-azer-parrocha","mauthors-philippine-news-agency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271787","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=271787"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271787\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":271795,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271787\/revisions\/271795"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/265787"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=271787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=271787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=271787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}