Former Senator Antonio Trillanes IV said on Monday, August 16, that he is holding the Duterte administration responsible for the recent death of a Magdalo member, as well as for the deaths of many others because of COVID-19.
He said in a Facebook post that their party lost a “dugong Magdalo,” which means someone who’s been in the party since its conception, over the weekend because of COVID-19.
“I am holding the Duterte admin responsible for his death and other COVID deaths for gross incompetence/corruption,” Trillanes stated.
Such “gross incompetence/corruption,” he added led to the incapability of the health care industry to address the needs of COVID-19 patients because they lack the personnel and equipment needed to “absorb case surges.”
READ: Active COVID-19 cases in PH soar to over 102K
In particular, Trillanes pointed out the government’s “failure to procure ventilators/oxygen tanks to increase the ICU/treatment capacity of hospitals” and “failure to mass mobilize family doctors and unemployed nurses/nursing graduates to augment our overworked frontliners and increase (the) capacity of our healthcare system in the event of case surges.”
A staunch critic of President Duterte, the former senator also called the administration for failing to secure enough vaccines to inoculate a majority of the population against COVID-19.
In February, Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. said it was Health Secretary Francisco Duque III who “dropped the ball” in the country’s negotiations to procure Pfizer vaccines.
The Philippines only began its inoculation of health workers on March 1 after China donated one million Sinovac doses, which have a lower efficacy rate compared to US-made Pfizer.
Aside from the low vaccine supply in the country, Trillanes also criticized the government’s “failed policies” to contain the more transmissible and contagious Delta variant that is now seen to be the driver of the surge in the National Capital Region (NCR) and other provinces.
READ: More Delta COVID-19 virus variant cases detected — DOH
He cited “failure to conduct targeted house to house testing in critical urban poor areas” also led to the increase in cases and deaths due to COVID-19.
On Sunday, August 15, the country’s testing capacity was at 59,857 tests per day amid the soaring COVID-19 cases. The Philippines reported 14,749 new cases, one of the highest daily new infections since the virus outbreak, on the same day.
Contact tracing of suspected COVID-19 patients has also been a thorn in the country’s fight to contain the virus. The country’s contact tracers have managed to only trace a handful of the passengers in the original flight that brought to the Philippines its first-ever COVID-positive patient.