Government is rushing to reopen the economy by reducing alert levels to the least restrictive Level 1 to ensure more business openings and more job creation for faster economic rebound.
The National Economic and Development Authority echoed an earlier call by Presidential Adviser for Entrepreneurship Joey Concepcion to reduce the alert level for NCR plus areas to level 1, or the least restrictive by March to add P11.2 billion to the economy each week.
Shifting from Level 2 to Level 1 would add 191,000 jobs per week and this would translate to P11.2 billion in gross value added per week in the NCR plus areas, said NEDA Secretary Karl Kendrick Chua.
Chua told the Management Association of the Philippines economic briefing that when Metro Manila, Bulacan, Cavite, Laguna, and Rizal were placed under Alert Level 3 last January due to an Omicron-driven surge in coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) cases after the holidays, this resulted in weekly productivity losses of P3 billion.
When the alert level was reduced to 2, Concepcion had asked the government to move to the least strict quarantine setting by March to restore economic activity.
The COVID-19 daily tally hit 4,575 on Thursday, bringing the active case count to 93,307.
Along with restoring economic activity, Chua has been supporting a return to face-to-face classes.
“Our thinking in NEDA is we will not get it right at the start, but it is crucial to pilot immediately (in) more schools so that we learn from the pilot,” he said. “The more we pilot, the more we will learn, the more we can get it right.”
The unavailability of physical classes could worsen the quality of education and cost the country P11 trillion in lost wages over the next four decades, NEDA has estimated.
“Learning was compromised by the prolonged school closure,” Brain Trust, Inc. Chair Cielito F. Habito said at the same event.
“Children of poor families in remote areas actually had no access… and therefore were left out of this remote learning exercise, and so the effect of these lost years will be felt years from now in terms of reduced worker productivity.”
Octa says NCR plus now at low risk
Octa Research Group fellow Fredegusto David said the NCR plus area is now at low risk from the coronavirus, as the country reported fewer than 5,000 coronavirus infections for the third straight day.
“As predicted two weeks ago, the National Capital Region improved to low risk as of Feb. 9,” OCTA David tweeted Wednesday.
He said Metro Manila’s coronavirus reproduction number on Feb. 3 to 9 declined to 0.25 from 0.41 a week earlier.
The virus positivity rate in the region has fallen to 9.1 percent from 15 percent, which is considered low but still above the 5 percent threshold set by the World Health Organization (WHO). The average daily attack rate also fell to a moderate 6.67 for 100,000 people from 17.83.
David said the capital region’s hospital use rate had improved to 29.6 percent from 37 percent.
The capital region is under Alert Level 2 until Feb. 15. The government is set to announce the virus alert level before the end of the week.
The Philippines posted 4,575 coronavirus infections on Thursday, bringing the total to 3.63 million, the Department of Health (DoH) said in a bulletin. The death toll from the virus hit 54,783 after 94 more patients died, while recoveries rose by 7,504 to 3.48 million.
It said 15.1 percent of 36,407 samples on Feb. 8 tested positive for COVID-19, still above the 5 percent level set by the WHO.
Of the 93,307 active cases, 3,316 did not show symptoms, 85,244 were mild, 2,991 were moderate, 1,444 were severe and 312 were critical.
DoH said 76 percent of the latest cases occurred on Jan. 28 to Feb. 10. The top regions with new cases in the past two weeks were Western Visayas with 451, Central Visayas with 400 and Metro Manila with 392 infections. It added that 70 percent of new deaths occurred in February and 12 percent in January.
It also said 176 duplicates had been removed from the tally, 132 of which were reclassified as recoveries and one was tagged as a death, while 47 recoveries were relisted as deaths. Five laboratories failed to submit data on Feb. 8.
The Health department said 39 percent of intensive care unit beds in the country had been used, while the rate for Metro Manila was 31percent.
BI expects 30% rise in arrivals
The country has allowed the entry of fully vaccinated foreign tourists.
In a statement, the Bureau of Immigration said it expects at least a 30 percent increase in arrivals on the first day of the opening of the country’s borders to travelers, noting that almost 7,000 tourists were expected to visit the country on Feb. 10.
It said most of the travelers would be Filipinos, while about 27 percent will be foreigners.
Meanwhile, foreign spouses and children of Filipino citizens, and former Filipino citizens with balikbayan privileges would no longer be required to carry return tickets, presidential spokesman Karlo Alexei B. Nograles told a televised news briefing, citing an order approved by a coronavirus task force.
He said citizens from 157 countries with visa-free arrangements with the Philippines may stay for more than a month for purposes other than tourism or leisure through an entry exemption document, reported Business World.
They must be fully vaccinated, except minors aged below 12 years traveling with a fully inoculated parent.
They must present a negative RT-PCR test taken within 48 hours before the date and time of departure from the origin country.
Nograles said foreign spouses and children of Filipino citizens who are not from these countries may now enter the Philippines “without need of an entry exemption document provided they have been issued a 9(a) visa with the appropriate visa notation.”
The Philippines is scrambling to test more Filipinos as it reopens the economy. On Wednesday, the government took delivery of 16,000 COVID-19 test kits from Israel’s defense ministry. It received about 10,000 test kits from the Israeli Ministry of Defense in November.
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