EDITORIAL - Cautionary tale

After three months of enduring various degrees of lockdowns, it would be a nightmare to revert to the strictest – enhanced community quarantine. At least two weeks of ECQ, however, is what Cebu City must again go through, after a spike in coronavirus disease 2019 cases, and observations that city officials and residents were ignoring COVID-19 health protocols imposed under the Bayanihan to Heal as One Act.

While national officials maintain that the country can no longer afford to revert Metro Manila to ECQ from the current general community quarantine, analysts from the University of the Philippines warn that a similar spike in COVID-19 cases is possible. The analysts attribute this to a combination of factors: weaker observance of health protocols such as physical distancing as the economy reopens, the continuing inadequacy of contact tracing including the use of vague information, and the still limited COVID testing capability.

The return of infections in places that have reopened for business, such as Beijing and Wuhan where the coronavirus originated, provide a cautionary tale. The two Chinese cities attribute the fresh cases mostly to residents stranded during the lockdowns and now returning to their homes. Beijing has since canceled about 70 percent of flights amid the spike. In New Zealand – the first country to declare last week that it had beaten COVID-19 – two women who arrived from the United Kingdom on June 7 have tested positive for the coronavirus.

In the Philippines, several local government executives have complained that residents who returned to their hometowns after being stranded in Metro Manila and other places during the ECQ accounted for fresh infections and even for the first cases in what used to be COVID-free areas.

While the COVID death rate has slowed down in Metro Manila, epicenter of the pandemic in the country, infections continue to go up. With restrictions being eased to revive economic activity, but still without a COVID vaccine or cure, people should be even more mindful of the need to observe health protocols. With lives and livelihoods at stake, there is no room for complacency. The coronavirus is very much alive and in our midst, ready to infect and kill.