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INILINAW ni Austriaco, kailangan magsagawa ng mga hakbang upang magkaroon ng proteksiyon ang populasyon laban sa mga bago at mas mapanganib na CoVid-19 variants.
Dapat aniyang magpatupad ng 10-day hotel quarantine para sa international travelers na lumalapag sa Metro Manila at Cebu dahil base sa pag-aaral, ito’y 99.7% epektibo para hindi makapasok ang variants sa bansa.
“There is no scientific evidence that a seven-day quarantine would protect us enough from the Indian variant. And if it enters Cebu, it will enter the entire country and it will be catastrophic because we will get another surge and it would destroy Christmas this year,” sabi niya.
“So my point is, let us not just follow India; let us not allow the Indian variant to enter the Philippines; let us follow the science. So instead of shortening the ten-day quarantine, we should seek ways to verify the vaccine status for returning Filipinos.”
Kahit may kamahalan ang ten-day quarantine, kailangan aniyang ipatupad ito para protektahan ang bansa laban sa Indian variant.
“And so, now we have to ask, are there ways to allow vaccinated Filipinos to bypass testing and quarantine? We can always consider the IATF (Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Disease) travel pass that will be released either this week or next week around the world for precisely this question,” ani Austriaco.
Ipinaliwanag niya na ang bakuna ay hindi nagagamit para sa kasalukuyang sitwasyon ng CoVid-19 dahil ang epekto nito’y mararanasan pa lamang sa loob ng anim na linggo hanggang dalawang buwan.
“Vaccines are used to prevent a future surge. And the reason why, is that vaccines take six weeks to two months to take effect. So if you are going through a current surge at the moment and you start vaccinating people, there will not be an effect on that surge for two months,” ani Austriaco.
Isang “good exit strategy” aniya na iprayoridad ang NCR plus eight sa vaccination program.
“And our hope and prayer, of course, is that a local government will be able to control a surge before that period. So, our exit strategy is a good exit strategy, it is a strategy that will hopefully give us a no-mask Christmas at least in the largest urban areas of our country.”
