Palace verifying number of health workers critically-ill with COVID-19 – Roque
Posted at Jun 10 2020 01:26 PM | Updated as of Jun 10 2020 01:43 PM
MANILA – Malacañang on Wednesday said it needs to verify the number of health workers who became severely ill with COVID-19 and are entitled to receive the law-mandated compensation of P100,000.
“I’d like to verify how many actually should be entitled because it may be difficult to believe that only about 20 frontliners became critically ill with COVID-19. So, we’ll have to check on that figure,” Presidential spokesman Harry Roque told ANC’s Headstart.
“Right now, they have identified under 20 persons to have received the P100,000 benefit,” added Roque, who also acts as spokesman of the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases.
The health department said Tuesday evening that only 19 health workers were confirmed to have suffered seriously from COVID-19.
All have received the P100,000 compensation provided for by Republic Act No. 11469, or the Bayanihan to Heal As One Act, Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said.
The figure was trimmed down from around 70 after medical records of many reportedly showed they only had mild or moderate symptoms, while some admitted to the Department of Health they were not severely ill.
The same law mandates that families of health workers who died from COVID-19 should also receive P1 million each. According to Vergeire, 30 of 32 verified beneficiaries have received their respective checks.
Last week, President Rodrigo Duterte ordered the formation of a new team within the DOH to take over the distribution of the financial benefits after the delay of the implementation was brought up by senators.
Duterte set June 9 as deadline for the disbursement of the benefits.
Asked who will be held accountable for the delay in giving out the financial benefits, Roque said, “I don’t know what’s going to happen now. It’s not a secret that the President was enraged in fact when he found out that here we are, always saying we value our frontliners, but we can’t seem to walk the talk because the benefits already provided by law were not given to them on time.”
Roque said that while families of soldiers killed in action receive their benefits within the week, Duterte “could not understand why health workers had to wait this long.”
“The President did say that heads will roll. I’m wondering now what actually will happen. That’s something I need to talk to him about – his early instruction about heads should roll – because this wasn’t acceptable,” Roque said.
Health Secretary Francisco Duque III had already acknowledged that the distribution of the benefits was part of his responsibilities as head of the department.
A total of 2,741 health workers, as of June 8, were confirmed to have contracted the virus that causes COVID-19, accounting for around 12 percent of the country’s total confirmed cases.
The tally includes the 32 fatalities (4 nurses, 26 doctors and 2 non-medical staff), as well as 1,598 who have recovered.
Of the 1,111 active cases, 987 have mild symptoms and only 1 is considered a severe case. A total of 123 health workers are deemed asymptomatic.
Among the infected health workers are 1,008 nurses, 738 doctors, 180 nursing assistants, 110 medical technologists, and 58 radiologic technologists, and 349 non-medical staff working in health facilities.
Meanwhile, Roque said the second tranche of cash aid for poor families will be distributed next week.
“The primary mode of distribution will be electronic this time. And since it’s electronic, to those who would be covered, they can distribute in 2 days time,” he said.
“Those who have no access to electronic payments will still be done manually. But this time, it will be disbursed with the assistance of the Armed Forces of the Philippines,” he added.
The Bayanihan Law mandates the provision of P5,000 to P8,000, in April and May, to each of around 23 million families in the country who are affected by restrictions imposed to curb the spread of COVID-19.
“Realistically, we are hoping that at least a majority of the P105 billion would already have been disbursed electronically (next week) because included also in the data is about 1.5 (million) more or less beneficiaries under the 4P’s,” he said.
Senator Risa Hontiveros has called for an audit on how the executive branch spent public funds and cited the questionable purchase of alleged overpriced PPEs, testing kits and other equipment by the DOH.
“it’s very easy to account for it because a big bulk of it is for social amelioration. The rest were spent to buy PPEs, medical equipment and the benefits to frontliners. So, w’ere really going to account for about a hundred billion more or less. And given the number of PPEs and other equipment that we have bought, that’s very easy to account,” said Roque.
