MANILA, Philippines — United States President Joe Biden on Monday signed legislation terminating the national emergency for COVID-19, which allowed the world’s biggest economy to take sweeping steps to respond to the pandemic. When will the Philippines follow suit?
Maria Rosario Vergeire, officer-in-charge of the Department of Health, said the country’s healthcare system must be better prepared before the state of public health emergency is lifted.
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“We are seeing that soon we will be able to lift this state of public health emergency. But everything must be in order before we do that. We are in constant coordination with the Inter-Agency Task Force and various agencies,” Vergeire said partly in Filipino on Wednesday.
The health official added the provisions in COVID-19 laws must be studied before the country ends the public health emergency for COVID-19 status.
“When we lifted the state of calamity, there were provisions in laws that we can no longer implement now,” Vergeire said.
The delivery of donated bivalent COVID-19 vaccines hit a snag after the country’s state of calamity for COVID-19 expired on Dec. 31, 2022. The state of calamity declaration had clauses on indemnification and immunity from liability required by vaccine makers.
The declaration of state of calamity allows the continued implementation of measures to combat the ongoing pandemic.
Still a ‘global health emergency’
In January, the World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said that COVID-19 remains a global health emergency, but he acknowledged that the pandemic is “probably at a transition point.”
The WHO first declared a so-called public health emergency of international concern as what was then called the novel coronavirus began to spread outside China on Jan. 30, 2020.
Former President Rodrigo Duterte declared a state of public health emergency in the Philippines on March 8, 2020, which allowed the implementation of relevant provisions of the Mandatory Reporting of Notifiable Diseases and Health Events of Public Health Concern.
It also allowed the utilization of resources to implement urgent and critical measures to contain the spread of COVID-19.
Cases by May
Daily COVID-19 cases in the Philippines may range between 289 and 611 by May 15, Vergeire said. The projection is based on the current transmission rate of the virus that causes COVID-19, vaccination coverage, and compliance to minimum public health standards.
Meanwhile, infections in Metro Manila may reach 30 to 122 per day.
The Philippines has confirmed over 4.08 million COVID-19 cases, including 66,429 deaths, since the pandemic started in 2020.
More than 78.4 million Filipinos have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19. Over 23.8 million people have received their first booster dose and nearly 4.4 million have gotten their second booster shot.