Former DOH chief Manuel Dayrit said Thursday the reduced physical distancing between passengers in public transport would be safe only if certain health protocols and conditions would be followed.
Dayrit made the statement amid controversies of the Department of Transportation’s (DOTr) implementation of reduced physical distancing, which began on Monday, September 14.
Dayrit said the one-meter physical distance could be reduced gradually, only if the following “seven commandments” are complied with:
- wearing face mask covering mouth and nose
- wearing of face shield
- no talking and eating
- adequate ventilation
- frequent and proper disinfection using bleach
- no symptomatic passengers and
- appropriate physical distancing
“We can do away with one-meter physical distancing, but incrementally and we have to monitor how it goes. This is a learning experience, but we cannot do one meter as a dogma,” he said.
“It is possible to go below one meter if there is proper implementation of seven commandments. One meter is not the dogma,” Dayrit added.
Reduced physical distancing
The former health chief said government policies should gear towards helping people survive COVID-19 and safely work.
“If we are dogmatic and maintain it at one meter, we are failing to dance with the virus, and that would make us more vulnerable. Our competitiveness will fall, and that should be taken into consideration,” Dayrit said.
“One meter distance is not the only way to prevent COVID-19 transmission. It is the norm, but it is not dogma. It is not gospel truth,” he added.
Dr. Edsel Salvaña, an infectious disease doctor from the Philippine General Hospital, earlier said the government’s decision to reduce physical distancing in public transportation is amid the coronavirus pandemic is “problematic.”
The use of face masks and face shields will mitigate virus transmission, but “close contact definition remains,” he said.
“The proposal to decrease the distance in public transport to less than one meter is problematic. If there is a single COVID-19-positive person in the transport, anyone less than one meter from him/her after 15 minutes becomes a close contact who will need to quarantine and can potentially spread the disease,” he added.
