The government's pandemic task force has amended the criteria for the de-escalation of provinces, highly urbanized and independent component cities (HUCs and ICCs) to Alert Level 1, Malacañang said.
In a press briefing, Communications Undersecretary Kris Ablan said that an area in the country could be de-escalated to Alert Level 1 upon meeting all of the following criteria:
- Low to minimal risk case classification
- A total bed utilization rate of less than 50 percent
- Full vaccination of 70 percent of its target population
- Full vaccination of 70 percent of its Priority Group A2 (senior citizens) target population
On Thursday evening, March 10, the Inter-agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases placed Iloilo City under Alert Level 1 effective immediately until March 15.
As of March 10, there are 40 areas under Aler Level 1, including the National Capital Region (NCR).
In addition, Ablan said that for NCR, all buses bound for provinces shall not be required to use the Integrated Exchange as the central hub for transportation.
In his first press briefing as the designated acting Palace deputy spokesman, Ablan said that the IATF would announce the new classifications before March 15.
"Masusi at dahan-dahan nating binubuksan ang ekonomiya kasabay sa pagpapabilis ng pagbabakuna ng ating mga kababayan (We are slowly, and in detail, opening the economy while we ramp up the vaccination of our fellowmen)," he said.
"Nandiyan pa rin po ang ating IATF (The IATF is here) and they are constantly monitoring the situation," he added.
As of March 10, a total of 138,008,339 doses of Covid-19 vaccines have been administered, with 64,212,568 individuals being fully vaccinated.