Presidential aspirant and Partido Federal ng Pilipinas standard-bearer Ferdinand 'Bongbong' Marcos, Jr. believes that medical research needs a bigger budget especially in crucial times like the COVID-19 pandemic.
Marcos said the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM) is an excellent laboratory in the country given its performance in the early months of the pandemic.
The former senator, however, revealed that the low budget of RITM has caused many missed opportunities since its research programs focused only on infectious and tropical diseases.
"Yung Research Institute for Tropical Medicine ay bagay na bagay ngayon ‘yan dito sa pag-aaral sa Covid. Pero kaya nga lang nung lumipas ang panahon, hindi binibigyang importansya itong mga institute na ito (The Research Institute for Tropical Medicine is well suited for research on COVID-19. But as time passed by this institute was never given importance)," Marcos said.
"Sayang naman at maraming missed opportunities pero may pagkakataon pa tayo, alam na natin ang problema. Alam na natin kung saan tayo nagkulang. I-build up natin 'yung mga facilities ng ating mga research. Napakaimportante, kasi naman ‘di natin iniisip dahil wala naman noong COVID, wala namang pandemya, ngayong may pandemya, pinaaalala sa atin na kailangang gawin ang lahat ng ito (What a waste and lots of missed opportunities but we still have a chance, we already know the problem. We already know what we are lacking. We need to build up our facilities for research. It's very important, but we never thought about it since there was no COVID, there was no pandemic. Now that there is a pandemic, it reminds us that we have to do everything)."
The former Ilocos Norte congressman also noted the need to bolster the University of the Philippines' National Institute of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology saying that the country is capable of producing its own vaccine.
"Dati gumagawa na tayo ng sarili nating flu vaccine, ginagawa sa UPLB (UP-Los Baños) at nakakapagbakuna ng 60 percent ng population. Kaya naman natin gawin pero kailangang pagtibayin at pagandahin ang sistema. Ang daming bagong teknolohiya na pwedeng i-take advantage (Previously we were making our own flu vaccine, it was made in UPLB (UP-Los Baños) and we can vaccinate 60 percent of the population. We can do it but we need to strengthen and make the system better. There are many new technologies that we can take advantage)," Marcos said.
Marcos added that he knows the purpose of having research facilities and increasing the budget aside from maintaining these facilities will be helpful now and in the future. (Melvin Sarangay)