Opposition Senator Risa Hontiveros on Sunday pressed Health Secretary Francisco Duque III and heads of the government’s task force against COVID-19 to reveal to the public their contingency plan amid reports of the new COVID variant already in the Philippines.

“Hindi pwedeng maging in denial sa banta ng bagong COVID-19 variant. Ang bagal na nga ng vaccine procurement natin, humina pa ang testing at laboratory operations natin (The government can’t afford to be in denial with this new COVID-19 variant. Our vaccine procurement program is already lagging, and our testing and laboratory operations have also dwindled). We can’t go back to square one,” Hontiveros lamented.
 
The senator said it is imperative to prepare hospitals nationwide for the worst-case scenario as the UK COVID-19 variant could be a game-changer “and if we are caught off guard many will die.”
 
“Tapos na ang 2020, pero hindi tapos ang pandemya. Handa ba ang mga ospital natin kung bigla na lang tumalon ang mga kaso natin to 300,000 a month? (The year 2020 is over but the pandemic isn’t stopping. Are our hospitals ready in case the COVID-19 cases jump to 300,000 a month?) That’s almost all our 2020 infections in a single month. Tigilan na ang (Let’s stop the) complacency,” she appealed.
 
The lawmaker said the government should immediately release a contingency plan amid reports that the new variant could already be in the country.
 
She said there could already be “missing cases” because the country’s pandemic response became lax during the holidays.
 
The drop in the reported number of cases in December despite the increase in foot traffic, she said, could be an indicator that testing had decreased.
 
“This is extremely worrisome because it means there is an increase in infections going undetected,” she said.
 
“Hindi magic bullet ang bakuna para sa pandemya. Lalo na at mabilisang mag-mutate ang coronavirus (The vaccine is not a magic bullet for this pandemic. Especially since this coronavirus can easily mutate),” she pointed out.
 
“Kay Sec. Duque at sa napakadaming COVID czars, huwag na nating ulitin ang nangyari last year noon hindi tayo naghanda dahil akala ng lahat ay tatlo lang ang kaso ng COVID-19 kasi hindi tayo nagte-test ng maayos. Yun pala, kalat na kalat na, (To Sec. Duque and to all our COVID czars, let’s avoid a repeat of last year’s mistake when we were not at all ready because we thought only three persons had COVID-19 because we failed to test properly. We didn’t know it has already spread),” Hontiveros said.
 
“Dapat hands-on-deck ang gobyerno sa pagpapalakas ng COVID response, kahit wala pang bakuna (the government should be hands-on-deck in strengthening its COVID response, even without the vaccine yet). We need to make 2021 a year of genuine recovery for all,” she reiterated.