Angara: Economy likely to collapse if NCR goes back to MECQ

The Philippine economy is likely to collapse if Metro Manila will slide back to modified enhanced community quarantine (MECQ), Senate Finance Committee chair Sonny Angara said Thursday.

Angara made the comments a week after presidential spokesperson Harry Roque, Jr. said that Metro Manila could be again placed under MECQ if the COVID-19 cases in the country reach 85,000 by the end of the month.

As of Wednesday, July 30, COVID-19 cases in the country have already breached 85,000 with over 1,800 new COVID-19 cases recorded in a day.

“Our economy will probably collapse if we go back to MECQ because that would be postponing the inevitable,” Angara said in an ANC interview.

“A lockdown approach is not a model approach because a model approach is trying to live with COVID-19, not to avoid it,” he added.

Sought for comment, presidential spokesperson Harry Roque said: “Hindi nagkakalayo ang pananaw ng IATF at ni Senator Angara.”

The Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF) is the highest policymaking body on COVID-19 response.

In a virtual briefing, National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) Undersecretary Rosemarie Edillion said the government is trying to rebalance economic recovery with anti-COVID strategies.

Edillion also reiterated the earlier stance of Acting Socioeconomic Secretary Karl Chua that the increase in testing capacity will ensure that the country will not revert to stricter lockdown. 

Nevertheless, she said that the priority is still “lives over the economy.”

Under the MECQ protocol, 50% of the workforce of each company are allowed to physically report to work although mass transportation is prohibited.

Metro Manila has been under general community quarantine (GCQ) since June 1, a protocol  that allows 75% of the workforce of each company or office to physically go back to work and provides for 10 to 50% of mass transport.

“Iyong lockdown approach, it is avoiding COVID-19. It is like saying, sige, next week na lang natin gawin ‘yan. But at some point, you have to face it and you have to live with the virus,” Angara, who has recovered from getting infected with COVID-19 twice, said.

Going forward, Angara said that increasing the country’s testing and improving contact tracing are the ways to stop COVID-19 transmission.

“We really have to increase testing, whether it is a private company or the government, you have to periodically test your people,” he said.

“The virus is alive and thriving. If you tested negative, after two days, it could be completely different.”

At least 116,000 individuals have tested positive for COVID-19, according to the Department of Health (DOH), but the confirmed cases is just at 85,000 because the results of other individuals who tested positive as reported by the laboratories are still pending validation of the department. —with Virgil Lopez and Ted Cordero/KBK/RSJ, GMA News