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PHILIPPINES - In Brief 03 Aug 2020 by Romeo Bernardo

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Two days after keeping Metro Manila under general community quarantine (GCQ), President Rodrigo Duterte last night returned the nation’s capital and surrounding provinces to the more restrictive modified enhanced community quarantine (mECQ) effective for two weeks from August 4 to 18. The decision was made in response to the urgent appeal of the Philippine medical community for a “time out” in light of an “overwhelmed” healthcare system. Yesterday, the health department added over 5000 covid-19 cases, the highest daily increase, bringing the total number of confirmed cases to over 100k, with Metro Manila and neighboring Region IV-A accounting for close to 67k cases. Noted professor and health economist now congresswoman, Stella Quimbo, showed us her estimate of the case doubling time in Metro Manila, which has fallen from 35 days at end May to 23 days as of July 9. The President, visibly piqued but needing to acknowledge the critical role of frontline healthworkers, acceded to the timeout but not without warning the group not to “demean” government by making a public call rather than communicating directly with him. He then asked the public to stay home to minimize infections while acknowledging that government does not have the resources to feed them this time around. This episode highlights the precarious balancing act that government has to do to achieve multiple goals on a constrained budget. On the one hand, with a national hunger rate of 20.9% in July, the highest since 3Q 2014, it cannot afford to keep the economy closed without the means to feed the 5.2 million households affected. On the other hand, with the disease’s reproduction number above 1, infections ar...