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News

Before announcing any extension of the quarantine, the IATF should finish releasing the P5,000- P8,000 food subsidy provided by the Bayanihan Law, or at the very least release the schedule, chart, and map of releasing the food subsidy: Food is the first line of defense in a quarantine

Posted at 10:53am : Before announcing any extension of the quarantine, the IATF should finish releasing the P5,000- P8,000 food subsidy provided by the Bayanihan Law, or at the very least release the schedule, chart, and map of releasing the food subsidy: Food is the first line of defense in a quarantine
         As early as one hour after the declaration of the Luzon lockdown March 16 and blockade and suspension of all public transport, the advice here was to preposition food packs for 9.5 million people and/or order the release the 13th month pay for all workers. See post here : https://marichulambino.com/2020/03/16/mass-public-transport-suspended-prepare-food-packs-9-5m-families-30-days-or-release-advance-13th-mo-salary-or-else-quell-food-riots-midway-of-quarantine-do-the-math-to-avoid-chaos-and-violence/

         Within 24 – 48 hours of the imposition of the lockdown,  many mayors, governors and the Vice President shone as brilliant as the blazing summer mornings in this country in this quarantine in the distribution of food and supplies and in transporting essential personnel like health workers (and one, Mayor Vico, is being prosecuted for it, VP Leny almost prosecuted for it).
           Frontliners – doctors, nurses, utility staff everywhere, security guards, grocery personnel, food delivery persons, dazzled the nation in rendering much needed services. Our frontliners are hailed because they directly face hordes of people who may be carrying the virus : They’re called “frontliners”  because they face the virus directly.
            On the macro level however, that is: In the community level and national level, while the bigger portion of the populace, the majority, are still alive and not infected, doctors and nurses are the last ones you need to see. In the macro level, doctors and nurses are your last line of defense.

      Your first line of defense is food in the quarantine.
      The Senate and the House unprecedentedly created new rules and assembled electronically to pass a law to release P2Billion to the national government for distribution as social amelioration and food cash subsidy for thousands of dislocated residents. Big and small corporations, media networks, peoples organizations, student organizations, netizens, all acted as one to raise funds for food distribution.
       The IATF and the national government, it is hoped, would be able to do well or better, now that it is poised to announce a two-week-to-a-month extension of the quarantine based on scientific data (scientific data that should be laymanized before announcing any extension … will write another post on that: Things to do before announcing any extension of the quarantine).
         Here is the first one:
         Before announcing any extension of the quarantine, the IATF should finish releasing the P8,000 food subsidy from the P2Billion, or at the very least release the schedule, chart, and map of releasing the food subsidy. This prevents panic. This stops anxiety. This averts fear.

        you know what — this will even stop the “fake news” and rumors from working: People will believe any rumor if they are anxious and hungry: Remove the anxiety and hunger and you deny “fake news” and rumor its power: Remove anxiety by releasing information early; remove hunger by releasing the food and food subsidies early.

       Stop the violence coming from the police and the military: Release the food and food subsidies. 

      At the very least: Release information on the schedule of release of food subsidies: Release the dates, the time,  the maps and charts, before announcing any extension of the quarantine.
       Because food is the first line of defense in a quarantine.

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Guide for Reporters: Reporting the DOH Data based on the DOH-admitted backlog of 5-7 days: Each figure reported daily is actually 7 days old, e.g., the number of 1,418 infected dated March 29 should be reported as: “due to backlog, this number is based on tests of April 22, 2020”

Posted at 11:31am

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Guide for Reporters: Reporting the DOH Data based on the DOH-admitted backlog of 5-7 days: Each figure reported daily is actually 7 days old, e.g., the number of 1,418 infected dated March 29 should be reported as: “due to backlog, this number is based on tests of April 22, 2020”
          DOH Secretary Duque revealed in an interview by DZBB’s Igan and Ali Sotto an hour ago that the DOH figures on number of confirmed cases of people infected being released everyday has a backlog of 5 to 7 days due to the length of time that the test results could be finalized because of the surge in the number of tests conducted.

         This means that while the entire test and processing itself takes 24- 48 hours, the long line of samples makes the releasing of test results delayed by about 5 to 7 days. See explanation at:
https://news.abs-cbn.com/news/03/27/20/doh-says-covid-19-testing-now-takes-5-to-7-days-ritm-to-address-backlog-soon

       In other words, the figures on number of cases of people infected are from tests conducted 5 to 7 days ago.

       In other words, they’re not real-time.

       Because of the absence of real-time data, extrapolations are being made by the best mathematicians in this country based on international epidemiological modelling standards.

         The simplest extrapolation is based on the rate of increase, e.g., our numbers are doubling every three days.

       Based on this simplest extrapolation, media practitioners out there — journalists, reporters, news anchors, editors and directors included – can do the math, right? Because you have a bigger platform, let’s help in disseminating the explainer.

     Why is this important?

      Because it is upon the big data that the decision on whether to lift the quarantine would depend.

      Wrong data means wrong decision, many will die.

      (Some of you will say that the extrapolation is very speculative but there is no other data available, and according to the mathematicians, it is based on internationally accepted epidemiological modelling standards.).

        So, here it is:

       If it’s doubling every three days …

       and the present data is from seven days ago…

        the modelling study made by some mathematicians …

          as laymanized by blog admin…

      is as follows (this is my laymanization, any mistake is mine alone)

March 22: 1,418 Number of people infected based on 5-7 days backlog

March 25: 2,836 Number of people infected based on modelling study of 100% increase every 3 days

March 28: 5,672 Number of people infected based on modelling study of 100% increase every 3 days

Today, March 30: 9,452 Number of people infected based on modelling study of 100% increase every 3 days

March 31: 11,344 Number of people infected based on modelling study of 100% increase every 3 days

      In other words, with the backlog of 5 to 7 days and based on the rate of increase at 100% every three days, the figure that comes closer to reality on the number of people infected as of today March 30 is closer to 9,452 than 1,418, because 1,418 is seven days old and the number is doubling every three days.

     In other words, as of today, unbeknownst to us and unbeknownst to the people infected themselves, there are most likely 8,034 people walking around infected but not tested and therefore undiagnosed.

      We’d like to find them so they can be treated and be given a comfortable room so they would not infect more people. That’s how to race with the virus.

      This shows the logic behind improving the capacity to test in order to accomplish massive and focused testing or, as many netizens hashtag it, #MassTestingNowPH (mass testing is not testing en masse but massive testing).

      The DOH Secretary has promised to release the real-time figures in a few days.

       As for presenting a contextualized discussion of the DOH figures, news editors and directors are faced with the question: Do we want people to know, or not know?

          That problem is not a mathematical question.