After two years of mobility restrictions, people are eager to shift to a post-pandemic “new normal” particularly in the National Capital Region, which accounts for about a third of the country’s economic output. There is high anticipation that by next week, the NCR will be de-escalated to Alert Level 1 and the economy can fully reopen.
After two years of battling COVID-19, however, the country is also fully aware of the continuing risks posed by the coronavirus. With the average daily COVID death toll nationwide steady at around 100, and considering the pandemic situation in other parts of the world, the country cannot rush the lifting of restrictions even as economic reopening continues.
The government’s pandemic response team has added metrics for de-escalation to Alert Level 1: 80 percent of seniors and persons with comorbidities as well as 70 percent of the general population must be fully vaccinated. Several epidemiologists say the additional parameters are not enough, and that the vaccination target for seniors with comorbidities should be 100 percent. At 80 percent, it would still leave about 1.8 million elderly and immune compromised at risk.
The consequences are being seen in the ongoing COVID surge in Hong Kong, where hospitals have become overwhelmed. This has led to people who test positive for COVID including Filipina domestic helpers being forced out of their employers’ homes. Hong Kong had enjoyed near-zero COVID cases for most of the pandemic, but the highly infectious Omicron variant managed to penetrate its defenses. And the cases have not been mild, which is why hospitals are overflowing with the infected. By most accounts, the cases needing hospitalization are mostly unvaccinated seniors and those with comorbidities.
Similar problems have been reported in Singapore and Indonesia, although their healthcare situation is not as dire as in Hong Kong. From below 200 cases per day in mid-December last year, Indonesia recorded 57,049 new Omicron-driven infections last Feb. 15 – breaking its pandemic record of 56,757 cases driven by the deadly Delta variant on July 15 last year.
In the Philippines, people’s preference for cheaper antigen testing, whose results are not recorded by the government, is blurring the pandemic picture and skewing projections that are critical for determining COVID alert levels. Hospital bed utilization, however, indicates that there is truly a downtrend at least in serious infections in the NCR.
Still, the unpredictability of Omicron and the possibility of more variants emerging make continued adherence to safety protocols of utmost importance amid economic reopening, particularly masking in public places, physical distancing and regular disinfection. The new normal does not mean pre-pandemic normal.