The province of Antique will remain under general community quarantine (GCQ) starting July 16 until the end of the month.
“The province will remain under GCQ but with heightened restrictions,” said Margie Gadian, secretary of the Antique Inter-Agency Task Force of coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19), in an interview Thursday.
She said they will wait for the guidelines from the National Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-EID) on the implementation of the heightened restrictions.
The Antique IATF will also have to set a meeting to discuss the guidelines to be implemented.
“We are glad that our appeal had been granted,” she said.
The IATF-EID initially placed Antique on a stricter modified enhanced community quarantine (MECQ) classification that was appealed by the provincial government and supported by the Western Visayas regional IATF.
Interior and Local Government-Antique provincial director Cherryl Tacda, in a separate interview, said that the retention of the province under GCQ will be good for the economy as the people could go out to report to their workplaces.
Governor Rhodora J. Cadiao on Wednesday’s meeting with the provincial IATF was apprehensive that the economy would be affected once the province would be placed under MECQ.
As of July 15, the province has 407 active cases, 126 deaths, and 2,146 recoveries from Covid-19.
Source: Philippines News Agency
