President Rodrigo Duterte may announce new quarantine classifications for July 16 to 31 on Wednesday, July 15, Palace spokesman Harry Roque said Monday.
“Posible pong Miyerkules ma-anunsyo ang classification dahil mayroon pa pong last meeting ang IATF (Interagency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases) bukas po, araw ng Tuesday, para sa final recommendation sa Presidente,” Roque said in an online Palace briefing.
During the same presser, National Task Force Covid-19 chief implementer Secretary Carlito Galvez hinted at the “escalation” of community quarantines in some areas due to the continuous increase in severe and critical Covid-19 cases.
“Nagkaroon po ng pulong ang ating IATF nang dalawang sunod na araw, noong Thursday at saka Friday at napagkasunduan po doon na may mga area po na mag-e-escalate considering that nakita po natin na tumataas po ang ating mga severe at critical cases at the same time iyong new cases tumataas rin po,” he said.
Metro Manila mayors recommended extending the region’s general community quarantine, Galvez and Roque said.
“Datos po ang tinitingnan natin kung tayo po ay magluluwag, at siguro po, at this point, the data does not indicate na pu-pwedeng magluwag po at least sa Metro Manila, para lang po to manage the expectations,” Roque said.
Duterte will meet Tuesday with local government units to discuss area evaluations and appeals.
The existing lockdown measures will lapse on July 15.
The country has recorded 57,006 Covid-19 infections, with 20,371 recoveries and 1,599 deaths. John Ezekiel J. Hirro