Tito Sotto opposes widespread lockdown due to COVID-19

The time is “not ripe” for enforcing widespread lockdowns even amid the continued rise of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) cases in the country, Senate President Vicente Sotto III said Thursday.

Sotto warned that a lockdown of Metro Manila will halt the country’s economy. He called it “a textbook case of overreaction.”

He suggested a localized containment of the coronavirus instead.

“The economy will grind to a halt as the flow of goods and people from the provinces to NCR, and vice versa, will be affected. The solution lies in more testing of the population and strict containment of heavily-affected areas, if such a scenario arises,” Sotto said in a statement.

The Philippines marked a surge in COVID-19 cases this month, with the number of infections steadily rising to 52 as of Thursday afternoon.

The Department of Health earlier said that no lockdown would be enforced until it confirmed cases of sustained community transmission in the country. —NB, GMA News