Karlo Nograles on possible escalation to Alert Level 4: “Kapag tumama sa parameters ng ating Alert Level System ay ginagawa naman po agad natin”
Cabinet Secretary Karlo Nograles said that the government’s pandemic task force would continue to escalate the alert level of provinces and cities with rising cases if figures breach the parameters.
Nograles, who was also the acting Presidential Spokesperson, gave this response when asked during the virtual press conference if there’s a chance that an Alert Level 4 would be imposed by the IATF.
“Yes. Kagaya ng sinabi ko kanina, kapag kinakailangan itaas ang alert level ng isang lugar saan man dito sa ating bansa, kapag tumama sa parameters ng ating Alert Level System ay ginagawa naman po agad natin,” Nograles said on Friday, January 7.
The country was currently grappling with a ferocious new surge in coronavirus cases that’s supposedly being fueled by the Omicron variant.
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Nograles, who also served as IATF spokesperson, said that the government will escalate the alert level based on the decision metrics once the parameters were breached and there’s a need to escalate.
“Basta tumama sa mga parameters at kailangang i-escalate dahil tumama na nga po sa mga parameters, based on our decision metrics ay i-escalate,” Nograles said.
Earlier, Nograles said that the country was already considered “high-risk” for COVID-19 because of the exponential increase in new coronavirus infections since the last week of December.
The pandemic task force gave general alert level classifications every two weeks; the current general classification for the Philippines was Alert Level 2.
Using the process that the acting Palace spokesman mentioned, however, the more stringent status of Alert Level 3 will have been hoisted over the NCR-plus (Metro Manila, Cavite, Bulacan, Rizal, and Laguna) and 14 other locations by Sunday, January 9.
The Alert Level System (ALS) for the pandemic response was a five-tier risk classification system, the most stringent being Alert Level 5. ALS replaced the region-wide quarantine classification system.
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