Coronavirus ailment (COVID-19) is an infectious sickness precipitated by using a newly located coronavirus. On 31 December 2019, WHO was once knowledgeable of cases of pneumonia of unknown motive in Wuhan City, China. A novel coronavirus used to be identified as the cause by Chinese authorities on 7 January 2020 and was once briefly named as “2019-nCoV”.  The Philippines cared about this issue because if the virus is not contained, the health care system may collapse due to the sudden resurgence of infected people, hospital may not accommodate all of the patients and may result to more casualties and uncontrollable spread of the disease.
March 07, 2020 – Department of Health (DOH) has officially declared the first confirmed local transmission of COVID-19 in the country. Different institutions are currently addressing this crisis.
 Educational Institution:
Department of Education (DepEd) allowed the suspension of class to protect the health of students and teachers. Educational Institutions decided to do Online Learning which means the teacher will give activities and lessons to students thru social media to fulfill their requirements. However, those who don’t have access to internet connection will be given a chance to comply when everything is back to normal. Many schools already suspend the online classes but some schools still push Online Learning Classes because some school just started their fourth quarter and really need to cope up with all the lessons and requirements. No school activities or sports trainings can take place and students are encouraged to take a break from activities and stay at home.
Religion:
Since we are on Enhance Community Quarantine because of Covid-19, our daily life changed. Classes are suspended, special occasions are postponed, and church services are also suspended. Even though church services are suspended, pastors, church leaders, and other churches did not stop on spreading the word of God, they used online broadcast to still bring praises, continue to worship and to deliver the message of the Lord to us, because right now we are in the middle of a crisis and we need to strengthen our faith in God especially in what we are experiencing now. And all of us know that we cannot surpass this crisis with just medicine etc, we need the help of God and prayers of each and everyone. God still made a way to bring His word into our houses by the use of live broadcast and social media, in that way we can pray for each other’s health, frontliners, and for fast recoveries. Covid-19 is a big crisis for us but we should always remember that our God is bigger than that and we will survive this pandemic crisis with God, we just have to surrender this pandemic to Him and let Him handle it.
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           Government:     Â
President Duterte imposed a travel ban on China’s Hubei Province after 1st case of COVID-19 in our country. After several weeks, the Department of Health has confirmed the 1st case of local transmission in the Philippines, President Rodrigo Duterte signed Proclamation 922 placing the entire Philippines under state of public health emergency. Many lawmakers are suggesting to put Metro Manila under 7-day lockdown but Duterte refused saying it will hamper the movement of basic commodities. A few days later, the President declared community quarantine in National Capital Region which automatically suspend the operation of non-essential shop and business for 1 month. Other province also does preventive measure and suspend the classes. 3 days later, government says that the plan seems useless. Duterte orders a new stricter protocol, an enhanced community quarantine which will put the whole island of Luzon into lockdown. If the previous protocol permits the operation of mass transportation, in the new protocol, it is prohibited. Essential operations are exempted. Going outside is also prohibited unless you’re a health worker, you need to buy necessities, or you’re going to hospital. Any kind of mass gathering is also forbidden.
The president also seeks an emergency power to let him act urgently to meet the current national health crisis. This request was eventually granted by the congress. This will give him 30 powers including reallocation, realigning, and reprograming of 2020 national budget.
The government also announced that it will implement a plan called National Action Plan (NAP) to control the virus from spreading in the country. Duterte said that this plan will help to strengthen the efforts of Department of Health.  This plan will be facilitated by Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF), composed of key officials involved in the government’s response to the pandemic.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_Luzon_enhanced_community_quarantine
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayanihan_to_Heal_as_One_Act
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Economic:
           The spread of COVID-19 has brought difficulties to the lives of a lot of people, their livelihoods, the student’s classes, the community and the businesses worldwide has been disrupted. No one expected this to happen and the economy wasn’t prepared for this crisis. Even the president of the United State, Donald Trump admitted that this was beyond his expectation. The spread of COVID-19 demands global cooperation among governments, international organizations and the business community. The Philippine Government is exerting all their efforts to overcome this crisis that affect the Philippine’s economy. President Rodrigo Duterte says that this is really a hard time especially for the budget and if the budget is not enough he will ask loan to other countries or he will be forced to sell other assets but the department of finances assured us that there are enough fond and there is no need to sell assets of the Philippines. But still, we have to expect a lot of changes because of the downfall of the economy, the lack of equipment to fight the virus and the lack of supply to those who needs especially at this time that most of the people has no job. Let’s just hope that the Philippines economy can cope up with the help of the government.
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Health:
The World Health Organization (WHO) has been working with governments to construct readiness and reaction capacities in nations to contain the flare-up and plan for conceivable community transmission.
In the Philippines, WHO has been working with the Department of Health and other national stakeholders and accomplices to extend its readiness to address COVID-19, counting the possibilities of more extensive transmission.
WHO recently mobilized its global stockpile of personal protective equipment (PPE) to support priority countries in their preparedness efforts. Introductory stocks were given over nowadays to the Department of Health for the utilize of wellbeing laborers. The PPEs comprised of veils, examination gloves, respirators, confinement outfits and other gear that will offer assistance secure cutting-edge wellbeing specialists as they analyze and treat patients. It supported the Research Institute of Tropical Medicine (RITM) to enable performing of diagnostic testing for COVID-19 in country through the delivery of reagents and chemicals. RITM can now release confirmatory results within 24-48 hours of receiving samples. Earlier to this, WHO given polymerase chain response (PCR) hardware to RITM so they can run diverse tests not as it were for COVID-19 but other irresistible infections such as HIV, polio, influenza-like sicknesses and serious intense respiratory diseases. World Health Organization provided technical guidance on surveillance, patient management, laboratory, infection prevention and control, country preparedness, among others, to the DOH and supported the localization of these guidelines. WHO is additionally planning a worldwide bunch of specialists to share case data, information investigation and research to have a much better understanding of COVID-19.
With the authority of the Division of Department of Health, WHO is supporting them on arranging and informing to communicate the dangers on COVID-19. An assortment of materials has been discharged counting exhortation for the open on defensive measures and the correct utilize of cover. WHO has too been at the side of DOH in briefing the media on the most recent overhauls and technical counsel on COVID-19 within the Philippines.
The Philippine government announced that it was joining the World Health Organization’s multi-country clinical trials in search for an effective COVID-19 treatment.
“Tayo po ay sasali sa Solidarity Trial na ginagawa ng World Health Organization para sa COVID-19,” Secretary Duque said while on a televised briefing.
In addition, Department of Science and Technology (DOST) is studying the effectiveness of virgin coconut oil in combatting COVID-19.
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The Philippines is trying their best on solving this health crisis but if we’re prepared enough, the damaged to the economy and to the lives of the people will not be this huge. We can adopt the strategy of South Korea where they did not imposed lockdowns. They started the battle with great preparedness. In the first month of the outbreak in the Wuhan, Chinese scientist release the DNA sequence of the virus. South Korean health ministry demanded the DNA sequence to the Chinese government. After receiving the information, they distributed it to different pharmaceutical companies in the country and started developing COVID-19 test kits. When the first outbreak of the disease sparked in South Korea, the started the mass testing right away. They followed a strict contact tracing. And the most important thing is they listened to their people.
Thank you for the info broo. Keep it going.! Suportahan kita