Amid new COVID-19 spike, Robredo reminds Filipinos: Don't be complacent
MANILA, Philippines — Coronavirus infections are on the rise once more despite the formal beginning of the government's national vaccination program, which should prompt Filipinos to stay vigilant with regards to minimum health standards, Vice President Leni Robredo said Sunday.
Speaking at her weekly radio show Sunday morning, the country's No. 2 reminded Filipinos that the current vaccine supply in the country is still limited to healthcare frontliners and professionals and later, senior citizens and persons with comorbidities.
This comes as the Department of Health on Sunday afternoon logged over 3,000 coronavirus cases for the third day in a row.
"We’ve been in lockdown for so long, so some people grew impatient. Others got complacent because there were days where we only had more than 1,000 cases. But now, it’s scary because there were 3,000 plus cases for the last three days," Robredo said in mixed Filipino and English.
"I hope we don't get complacent even if there are available vaccines now. We [in government] should show that too," she added, pointing to recent resolutions by the government's coronavirus task force looking to ease travel restrictions, particularly health requirements, for travelers.
Earlier Sunday, the Department of Health also reported that the Philippine Genome Center had found that one of 30 anonymized samples from the Philippine General Hospital was found to have traces of the South African coronavirus variant.
To date, exactly 594,412 coronavirus cases have been recorded by the department.
The Philippines, among the hardest-hit countries by the pathogen, is still under the world's longest quarantine.
"It's been some time now that the number of cases has been slowly rising," the vice president also said, citing a report by the OCTA Research Group of top barangays with new COVID cases in Metro Manila.
"This is why we should not relax our health protocols," she said.
— Franco Luna
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