PCP president asks gov't to go slow at cutting quarantine time for public

The president of the Philippine College of Physicians on Tuesday urged the government to think twice about its plan to shorten the quarantine period of individuals who will test positive for COVID-19 but are fully vaccinated and asymptomatic.

According to Joseph Morong's report on "24 Oras," Dr. Maricar Limpin said cutting the quarantine period of health workers was understandable due to the surge in cases, but the government should slow down on doing the same thing for the public.

"Talagang kulang na kulang. 'Yan ang nagiging problema sa mga ospital kahit na gusto magdagdag ng mga hospital beds, hindi makakapagdagdag kasi walang tatao," she said.

Last week, the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) approved a shortened isolation and quarantine period for fully vaccinated health workers infected with or exposed to COVID-19 to five days.

This was decided after hospitals raised concerns about being short staffed amid the surge in cases.

The Department of Health on Tuesday said it will propose to the IATF a shortened quarantine period of five days this time individuals who will test positive for COVID-19 but are fully vaccinated and asymptomatic.

Earlier, Health Secretary Francisco Duque III said the Omicron has surpassed Delta as the dominant variant in the country.

"Base sa pinakahuling run of whole genome sequencing, 60% na po ng samples na nasequence ay positive na po for Omicron varaint so siya na po nagdo-dominate na variant whereas before it was the Delta," Duque had said.

But Limpin said aside from the Omicron variant, the Delta variant is still present.

"So ano 'yong 40%? The 40% can be Delta variant so we don't know yet dahil may mga nakukuha pa kaming napupunta sa ICU," she said.—Ma. Angelica Garcia/LDF, GMA News