JUST AN OPINION

"Tagkaro News Legazpi's"post dated June 16, 2021, says that "Mga Bikolanong Doktor, Nanawagang Ilagay sa ECQ ang Bicol Region" (Bicolano Doctors Call for Placing Bicol Region Under ECQ) for two to three weeks in the light of the alleged "surge of Covid-19 cases in the Region".

 

From March 15, 2020, until sometime in June of the same year, almost the entire nation was placed on Enhanced Community Quarantine (ECQ) but with little effect on the aim to "flatten the curve", but instead hurt the economy and the Local Government Units' finances.

 

Can we still afford an ECQ? Or is it the practical and assured solution? People always thought that minimizing unauthorized travels, observance of the one-meter social distancing, using face masks and face shields, use of disinfectants are enough.

 

I remember that consulting with doctors always requires "referrals" to specialists, which is practical and sound.   But in the calling for ECQ  it seems that this "group of Doctors" have all become epidemiologists or scientists.

 

I once heard in a radio program with a medical doctor as a guest saying that the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Infectious Diseases (IATF) should "involve not any doctor but by experts on epidemiology or scientists".

 

Corollary to a post by Brigada 91.5 News FM Legazpi on a government employee's concern about his confinement at the Ibalong Recreation Center, the statistical presentation of  COVID-19 should be reviewed for a more accurate representation. Of course, the allegations in the Open Letter coursed through the news outlet should be investigated.

 

Indeed everyone from the suspects, those for verification, the asymptomatic, with unknown history of exposure, and with the onset of illness are included in the statistical data of cases.  

 

These are cases indeed but do not portray a precise picture of the situation.  Ideally, the data should be segregated for each specific case so as not to cause undue anxiety to the public, and for an effective remedial approach.

 

The same is true in Police Data on Crime Index.  It appears that the crime rate is alarming because the data include road accidents.  I agree that road crashes and accidents by definition are crimes or felonies because it involves physical injuries, homicide, or damage to property through reckless imprudence.   But they too have to be listed distinctively.