0240E: When is a Lockdown Not a Lockdown


Metro Manila Community Quarantine - Day 02

The checkpoints around Metro Manila are a joke and coupled with the DOTR limitations on public transport to maintain social distancing resulted in huge clusters of people huddled together either waiting for government inspection and interrogation before being allowed into NCR, or hordes of people waiting in queue for public transportation to get around the metropolis and other crazy scenarios.

There was more talk of a more extreme lockdown in response to the poor management of people at these border checkpoints (with stories like there being 50+ checkpoints with only 25 temperature scanners between them) with hints from Bong Go that the President was going to give a speech and then Panelo doubling down by saying he has already declared that all of Luzon is under "enhanced community quarantine".

We waited all day to hear what the President had to say this time around while different media and political personalities chimed in and speculated what these enhanced measures would be like. And of course when the President finally addressed the nation through a pre-recorded statement...we didn't really walk away with a clear idea of what was going to happen. 

It took several members of Duterte's cabinet holding their own press briefing after the president's statement aired to explain the actual conditions of the enhanced community quarantine, which largely meant someone reading the actual statement that the President fudged the reading of.

I swear, it's not the virus that will kill us but the stress and anxiety caused by the confusing manner in which the government handles this crisis that will.

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