The contact-tracing formula that was formulated by contact-tracing czar Benjamin Magalong and would have boosted the government's fight to contain the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), is impossible to achieve, the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) admitted on Sunday, March 21.
Under the Magalong Formula which was named after Baguio City Mayor Benjamin Magalong who conceptualized the contract-tracing strategy, is that there should be one contract-tracer for every 30 to 37 people who made close contact with a COVID-positive person in urban areas and one contract-tracer for every 25 close contacts in rural areas.
But DILG Undersecretary and spokesperson Jonathan Malaya said the Magalong Formula is virtually impossible to achieve due to the current transmission rate in the country. Magalong, however, suggested the formula long before the sudden upsurge of cases this year.
Malaya explained that for every COVID positive person, the contact tracers will have to reach out to 30 of his close contacts.
But when one of those close contacts turned out positive as well, Malaya noted that another 30 of his close contacts should be looked out for, so on and so forth.
"So exponential yung pagtaas and we do not have that many na tao na nagko-contact trace (The rise in the number (COVID-19 cases) is exponential and we do not have that many contact tracers for that),’’ Malaya said.
The DILG official said there are already 10,000 contact tracers in Metro Manila and other government agencies have also deployed their personnel to boost the country’s contact tracing efforts.
“All in all, the total number of contact tracers in the country is 225,000, including police personnel,’’ he added.
Magalong said local government units (LGUs) will be "recapacitated" to improve their contact tracing efforts from low productivity.
On March 20, the Health Department reported 7,999 new COVID-19 cases, the highest daily count so far in the country.