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GOVERNANCE
National and Local Government in the Philippines: Challenges and
responses amid of pandemic due to COVID-19.
The world has experienced a prolonged period of uncertainty and unrest caused by
the Corona-virus or COVID-19 pandemic. To date it has already affected the lives of
peoples in 213 countries globally. These countries are the most and advanced as
well as the poorest one but the most glaring difference is in the manner of their
respective governments to manage the containment and the isolation of the
disease. And as a mere fact, Philippines is one out of the 213 countries that is
currently sailing its boat against the sudden wave of COVID-19 in the country.
Since December 2019, news about the outbreak of Novel Corona virus had been all
over the news, covering and broadcasting the seriousness of the impact brought
about by the new epidemic from China. Despite being aware of it, during the last
weeks of December 2019 and practically the whole month of January 2020, there
was no initiatives from the Philippine government aside from its reaction to the first
virus-infected cases which came out in the last part of January, where a Chinese
couple came in the country from Wuhan to the central City of Cebu and travelled to
another island City of Dumaguete before they went to Manila tested positive after
confirmatory test from Australia. China has locked down Wuhan and Hubei on
January 23, 2020. These people left the City of Wuhan just before the locked down.
Aside from the couple, another Chinese woman tourist arrived in the central part of
the country on the day of China’s locked down. She also carried with her the virus
from Wuhan. She became patient number 3 in the country. This one part of
negligence and lack of preparedness by the government for this virus made them
encounter a major challenge. Such as, having only the Research Institute for
Tropical Medicine (RITM) to have preliminary testing capacity on the virus but the
confirmation would be from Victoria Infectious Disease Reference Laboratory in
Melbourne, Australia, and having not enough testing kits. In addition, the health
care system of the country is very weak. For a country of almost 109million
population, it has only 89,000 hospital beds and only 1,000 intensive care units
(ICUs). The Philippines has a total umber of 129,000 doctors, 80,000 are members
of the Philippine Medical Association (PMA) of whom only 50% are active. In terms of
2020 budget allocation, the budget of the DOH is P166.5billion which includes Phil
Health (Philippine Health Insurance) and P7 billion budget lodged under the
miscellaneous and Personnel Benefits Fund. Also, people around the country are on
the panic buying mode already, hoarding basic necessities, alcohols, sanitizers, face
masks and medicines.
As a respond to such negligence at first hand, on February 2, [Link] declared
temporary ban on all people coming from China, Macau and Hong Kong. This
delayed in the declaration of the ban was very decisive in terms of stopping the flow
of Chinese tourists to the country and is later on extended. On the first week of
February, both Houses of Congress (Senate and House of Representatives) were
busy investigating and tracing the 440 Filipino passengers who flew with the
Chinese couple. On March 7, 2020, there was the case of husband and wife who
were positively confirmed with the virus with no history of travel abroad and they
were to be the first local transmission. The Department of Health (DOH) declared
Code Red Sub-Level 1 and imposed a public health emergency. This imposition
authorized DOH to mobilize resources for the procurement of safety gear and the
imposition of preventive quarantine measures. On March 9, 2020, Pres. Duterte had
issued Proclamation No. 922 placing the country under a State of Public Health
Emergency obviously upon the recommendation of the DOH. The government had
considered COVID-19 constitute an emergency that threaten national security which
requires a whole-of-government-response. Two days after the declaration of Code
Red Sub-Level 1 and during a Senate hearing, DOH admitted that the total number
of testing kits in the country at this time was just 2,000 amidst its declaration of
Public Emergency based on the development of [Link] March 11, 2020, the
World Health Organization had declared COVID-19 a pandemic since it had inflicted
more than 150,000 people including 6,000 deaths all over the world. The Philippines
during this period had so far confirmed cases of 140 people including 12 deaths.
The following day (March 12, 2020), Pres. Duterte declared Code Red Sub-Level 2.
He had imposed partial lock down in Metro Manila and suspended all classes in the
metropolis until April 12, 2020. PRRD did not directly call it lock down, he used the
term “Community Quarantine” from March 15-April 14. On March 16, 2020, the
entire island of Luzon (including Metro manila) was placed under an “Enhanced
Community Quarantine”. Social distancing was strictly imposed. The COVID-19
cases in the Philippines during this time were 142 including 12 deaths. The following
day (March 17, 2020), PRRD signed Proclamation No. 929, declaring the Philippine
under the State of Calamity for a tentative period of 6 months due to COVID-19.
This proclamation enjoins all government agencies and local government units
(LGUs) to render full assistance and cooperation and mobilize the necessary
resources to undertake critical, urgent and appropriate response and measures in a
timely manner to curtail and eliminate the threat of COVID-19. The declaration had
afforded the National Government as well as the LGU’s, ample latitude to utilize
appropriate funds, including the Quick Response Fund, in their disaster
preparedness and response efforts to contain the spread of COVID-19 and to
continue to provide basic services to the affected population. The Presidential
Proclamation immediately makes available P16 billions of the Calamity Fund under
the 2020 National Budget. On the other side, local government units of some
provinces were prompted to suspend all classes from all levels and later on imposed
the community quarantine because of the increase of positive cases. The practice of
strict social distancing was highly observed and staying at home is greatly
appreciated in order to mitigate the transmission of the virus and to keep track on
it. Some LGUs, knowing that there were lacks of testing kits were doing their
outmost initiative to procure them from other countries not only relying to the DOH.
And particularly strategizing on how to help their people while having the
community quarantine that restricts them from going to work. And there are still
more responses from the government that are on the process as of this time. With
all the lapses, the response of the government may not be the best among the rest
but by all means an effective one.
We all know that this virus isn't just something we can neglect on, and as a citizen
of this country we shouldn't just rely all of the challenges we are facing at right now
to the government because they themselves are trying their best to make use of all
the possible means just to win against this covid-19. Let's just do our part to help
not as to become a burden.
Doing things differently: Innovations at the local level on how they will
mitigate the virus. On your own perspective suggest some innovation and
strategies how to end the pandemic.
Philippines as one of the developing countries, due to resource limitations, find it
hard to implement mass-screening programmes like mass testing to uncover new
infections and buy as many personal protective equipment as per needed of our
front liners. Due to this lack of resources the Philippine government both national
and local and even the local people raised new ways, innovations, and strategies to
mitigate or constrain the virus.
First, the implementation of enhanced community quarantine, whereof focuses on
the restrictions of social gathering, highly observed social distancing, proper
hygiene that involves sanitizing. Second, the innovative locals making face masks,
professional researching on how to produce PPEs of their own. Third, the
government funding for the ayudas given to those people who are affected of the
quarantine and funds allocated to the DOH in fighting this covid-19. Lastly, there
were many to mention.
On my own perspective, to constrain fast-spreading pandemics such as COVID-19,
speed is essential. Preparedness measures must outpace the pace of transmission.
One key measure is to rapidly identify infected people so they can be quarantined
and treated. But due to lack of facilities and testing kits the action against this is
getting slow. So, real-time contact tracing might be feasible, unless if people aren't
cooperative enough. Building trust between government and citizens, including
through strong communications and focusing on reaching vulnerable communities
with the information they need are also a great way. Actually there are lots of ways
but it's still up for us if we're responsible enough to take action.