By RALPH LAWRENCE G. LLEMIT, SunStar Davao City
March 01, 2022
DAVAO City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio is pushing for the lifting of some Covid-19 restrictions and fast-tracking the further reopening of the city's economy.
Duterte-Carpio said in an interview stream lived on her official Facebook page Monday, February 28, that the City Government will issue an executive order to suspend some Covid-19 restriction policies.
This came after Davao City has been placed under a less-strict Alert Level 1 effective March 1 until 15 due to the continuing downtrend of Covid-19 cases.
The mayor did not specify when the executive order will be released.
Despite the lifting of some restrictions, she said the minimum health protocols, such as wearing of face masks and observing physical distancing, will remain.
“[Walaon na] Kanang pag-lockdown, pagsarado sa mga offices and businesses depende sa (We will lift the lockdowns, closure of offices and establishments depending on the) alert levels, so we want everyone to open, and we want everybody to be on full operations, except we will not lift the mandatory wearing of mask, and importante gihapon ang distancing (distancing is still important),” the mayor said.
The mayor cited the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF) guidelines on Alert Level 1, allowing local governments to suspend implementations of Covid-19 restrictions.
"Naa didto sa IATF resolution na pwedeng i-suspend sa local government ang implementation sa mga Covid-19 restrictions, which is mao pud atong direction sa pagkakaron (The IATF resolution provides local governments the authority to suspend implementations of Covid-19 restrictions, which is the direction we are pushing), in lieu of this war dinha sa (there in) Ukraine ug (and) Russia because any war sa tibuok kalibutan will affect kitang tana (in some parts of the world will affect everyone),” she said.
“We need to move fast in reopening our city and economy tungod kaning giyera dinha sa Russia ug Ukraine duna na siya epekto diria sa ato (because the war in Russia and Ukraine would have a huge impact to everyone), especially in terms of prices sa (of) basic commodities, prices sa gasolina (and gasoline prices),” she added.
The move, she said, would uplift the business sector and provide more jobs to Dabawenyos.
Duterte-Carpio, meanwhile, said the business sectors will be given discretion in imposing restrictions against unvaccinated individuals.
She said, though, that restricting those unvaccinated would be difficult to impose.
“As I said kaniadto, lisod kaayo i-restrict ang mga unvaccinated (As I said before, it is hard to restrict those unvaccinated) when, in fact, dili man mandatory ang atoang vaccination. Mura gani’g gina-punish nato sila sa choice na ilang gipili na gitagaan man sila sa choice (since vaccination is not mandatory. It’s like we are punishing them for their choice),” Duterte-Carpio said, adding that restricting them would be possible if law would mandate the public to get vaccinated.
Dr. Michelle Schlosser, spokesperson of the Covid-19 Task Force, said the recent surge, suspected to have been caused by the Omicron variant of the Sars-CoV-2 virus, is over as the positivity rate drops to five percent as of February 20.
Schlosser said the city is considered "low risk" for the virus, and that it can now slowly shift to the “new normal.”
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