Camiguin, Basilan requests to stop entry of stranded persons: Lorenzana

July 2, 2020

Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana said the island provinces of Camiguin and Basilan requested to stop the entry of locally stranded individuals (LSI) in their area.

"Two island provinces the other day requested that they will not receive the locally stranded individuals from Manila yet for the next two weeks," Lorenzana said in an online forum on Thursday.

"According to them, their health facilities are becoming overwhelmed. They no longer have available isolation centers or isolation facilities. That is Camiguin and Basilan", he added.

Lorenzana said the cases of COVID-19 in Visayas and Mindanao have increase because of the LSIs who returned to their provinces.

"Maybe you would think that these islands are free or, are free from the COVID-19 infection but no, because of the lockdown that happened from March up to June there were lots of residents of these  provinces not only Camiguin and Basilan but other provinces in the south and in Visayas who were locked down in Metro Manila and for some reasons some of them got infected and when they went home they started infecting others," he said.

Lorenzana said Samar had '' practically zero about a month ago.

''But when they started receiving the balik probnisya program and the LSI recently they have about couple of hundreds of cases and three deaths. So it's not easy to bring those COVID-19 infected people to the provinces... islands and isolate them unless the island is uninhabited and we can just turn it into containment island or area," he added.

Lorenzana also mentioned the alarming increase of new cases of COVID-19 in Central Visayas.

"While the National Capital Region still has the most number of cases, there is an alarming rise of fresh cases in Region 7. We were there yesterday to see what's happening in Region 7. Through the designated overseer of Cebu,  (Environment) Secretary (Roy) Cimatu, the government has provided special attention to mitigate and forestall worsening effects of the pandemic in the Cebu area," he said.

Lorenzana said these figures place  the Philippines third in the Asean region in terms of total number of cases and first for having the most number of fresh cases  last month.

'' I think Singapore has larger cases per 100,000 people than the Philippines, I think they (have) 34 and we have seven deaths or seven cases per 100,000," he added.

Lorenzana said "from both global and national perspective we are far from seeing the end of COVID-19."

"As of yesterday, we have 38,511 number of cases, 10,038 recoveries, 1,270 deaths and out of these death(s) yesterday was only four, very good improvement," Lorenzana said.

He said  the government has"minimized the mortality rate of COVID-19 patients, thanks to the best practices of doctors and health workers who have improved, refined their scientific approach to... the pandemic."

"The security sector has also played a crucial role in the repatriation efforts of OFWs who were laid off or lost their jobs abroad at the time when everyone is... affected by the pandemic, sending them back home to rejoin their families. It's the least you can do to reciprocate contributions to our economy. As of 30 June, we have repatriated 69,00 OFWs to their provinces," he added.  Robina Asido/DMS