Marcos allows voluntary wearing of mask indoors

Pres. Ferdinand “Bong Bong” Marcos is set to issue an executive order allowing the voluntary wearing of face mask in indoor establishments.

This is according to Department of Tourism Secretary Christina Garcia Frasco.

Frasco said, during today’s Palace briefing, the move was “agreed” upon during a Cabinet meeting.

She said it was agreed that the President would be issuing an order to make indoor mask- wearing also voluntary all over the Philippines with few exceptions.

But, Frasco emphasized that wearing a mask is still required in public transportation and medical facilities.

“Masks are “highly encouraged” for Filipinos who have comorbidities, are senior citizens, and have yet to receive COVID -19 vaccines”, Frasco said.

She took note the direction of the Marcos administration is to lift the remainder of travel restrictions into the Philippines, and that includes easing of mask mandates to “Allow our country to be at par with our Asean neighbors who have long liberalized their mask mandates,”

This comes over a month after Marcos signed an order making the wearing of face masks outdoors optional.

Update on Covid 19

Yesterday, OCTA Research Group revealed that cases of Covid 19 cases in the National Capital Region (NCR) went up last September by 19% positivity rate due to the entry of Omicron subvariant XBB.

But the group noted that in October, the positivity rate is now at 12.9%, meaning the cases are going down.

This, despite the down trend of COVID 19 cases, OCTA Research noted ten provinces and regions with high covid case as of October 22. These were NCR – 503, Davao del Sur – 111, Cavite – 107, IloIlo – 102, Cebu -84, Laguna – 68, Rizal – 61, Pampanga – 46 and Batangas – 42.

In the Bicol Region, there were reported 200 cases of Covid 19 for the past week.

Based on the morbidity Week 42 report of DOH Bicol Region, 86 cases were recorded in the province of Camarines Sur, 56 cases from Albay, 30 cases from Sorsogon, 12 cases from Cam Norte, 6 cases from Masbate and 3 cases in the province of Catanduanes.