MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine National Police (PNP) will closely monitor churches as government has allowed up to 30 percent capacity for attendees of religious activities in areas under general community quarantine (GCQ) like Metro Manila.
Gen. Guillermo Eleazar, PNP chief, ordered police commanders to coordinate with religious leaders in their respective areas of responsibility to ensure that minimum public health standards are being observed at churches.
“As I’ve told commanders, let’s not wait for us to be called to help or address incidents of violations before taking action,” Eleazar said in Filipino.
Among the churches being monitored by police are Quiapo Church in Manila and Redemptorist Church in Parañaque City.
Eleazar urged churchgoers to strictly observe public health safety protocols to avoid getting infected with COVID-19.
Drop in quarantine arrests
Meanwhile, the number of apprehended community quarantine violators in the National Capital Region (NCR) Plus bubble – which includes Bulacan, Rizal, Laguna and Cavite – has gone down by at least 19 percent.
Eleazar said around 51,000 persons were accosted in NCR Plus last week, compared with the 63,000 individuals rounded up the previous week.
“It’s a good sign that as we relax in terms of restrictions on travel and movement, the number of those being accosted continues to go down,” he said in Filipino at the Laging Handa briefing.
The PNP chief attributed the decrease in number of quarantine violators to the government’s information drive and the deployment of more police to monitor public places.
Since the start of the pandemic last year, at least 1.05 million people have been apprehended for violating quarantine restrictions. Of that number, 614,542 were in Luzon, 259,139 in Mindanao and 182,199 in the Visayas.