HERE we go again.
About the same month a year ago, Laguna province underwent a two-week enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) due to the rising cases of Covid-19 in the province, as well as in Metro Manila.
At that time, we’re still averaging no less than a thousand cases per day. Everyone had thought we’re all overacting with the disease.
Delta variant? We hardly knew it then. And we had all pinned our hopes on the vaccines that are still under development at that time to bring life back to normal.
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A year later, Laguna province is once again under ECQ, but this time, under entirely different – and more alarming – circumstances.
Despite the glib reassurance of health officials, it’s clear that the more transmissible Delta variant may have already spread throughout the province.
Delayed testing and genome sequencing has thrown everyone off track. There’s now no reassurance that the Delta variant will not spread, given the more contagious nature of the variant.
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Meanwhile, rumor-mongers have done an incredible amount of damage in the days before ECQ was imposed over Metro Manila.
Rumors that unvaccinated individuals could be arrested, kept inside their homes, or kept out of the government’s cash assistance program have sent THOUSANDS rushing (yes, rushing) to Covid-19 vaccination centers on the eve of ECQ.
What health authorities are worried about now is that these crowds could have become spreaders for another spike in Covid-19 cases.
In India, a religious event which drew thousands has been pinpointed as one of the root causes of the sudden surge that effectively crippled the country’s healthcare system.
Congratulations, fake-news purveyors. You have just invented a new stupid way to create panic and alarm.
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Moreover, it now appears that the IATF’s decision to let children outdoors last month may have been one monumental mistake.
Hospitals are now reporting children – newborns, even – testing positive for Covid-19.
What’s more worrying, according to an official at the Philippine General Hospital (PGH), is that majority of such cases are now suffering moderate to severe Covid-19 symptoms.
The trend of children contracting Covid-19 is not new, actually.
In the last week alone, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children's Hospital Association, nearly 72,000 cases were reported among children, roughly 19 percent of the total number of new cases in the United States.
While hospitalizations and deaths remain low, the number of child coronavirus infections increased by 3 percent over the last two weeks of the month after declining earlier in the summer, according to a report by National Public Radio (NPR).
"There is an urgent need to collect more data on longer-term impacts of the pandemic on children, including ways the virus may harm the long-term physical health of infected children, as well as its emotional and mental health effects," the report reads.
In the United States, health authorities, including the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) have already given emergency use authorization for the use of Covid-19 vaccines to children.
In the Philippines, no such EUA has been given for Covid-19 vaccine use for children, although the Department of Health (DOH) and several sectors have pushed to give out vaccines to children.
Will our health officials – as usual – act when it’s too late? Let’s hope not.