Gov't retains risk-based testing policy amid Delta variant threat

The Philippines will carry on with its risk-based approach in detecting  COVID-19 cases amid the threat of the highly contagious Delta variant, the government’s testing czar Vince Dizon said Thursday.

Speaking at a Palace news conference, Dizon said the government has limited resources that should be devoted also to other strategies to curb the spread of the virus such as isolation, treatment, and vaccination.

“Our Delta variant problem cannot be solved by one strategy,” he said in Filipino.

“Just because you increase the number of tests to 100,000 per day doesn’t mean we can already solve our problem on the Delta variant. There must be simultaneous efforts given our limited resources,” he pointed out.

Likewise, he said that the government would use antigen testing to complement the standard RT-PCR test in light of the continued rise in cases.

Still, the government would focus on a risk-based strategy, meaning only persons with symptoms, close contacts of a COVID-19 patient, or persons coming from areas with high cases of COVID-19 would be subjected to testing, he added.

Dizon said the country was conducting around 56,000 tests per day on average, but Vice President Leni Robredo believed this should be increased to 120,000 daily.

Metro Manila will revert to the strictest lockdown from August 6 to 20 to curb further transmission of the Delta variant. —LBG, GMA News