President Rodrigo Duterte maintained last September 16, Thursday, that the face shield mandate will persist despite ongoing skepticism, current Covid-19 response fiasco, and alleged conspiracy with Pharmally Pharmaceutical Corporation.
“Itong face shield will provide an added premium of prevention. It might not really be a big percentage, but even if it’s just 5% more protected because you have the shield, mas maganda na yan,” the President stated in his “Talk to the People” aired yesterday.
Ironically, he and his present cabinet members were not wearing face shields during the taped address.
In August, the Commission on Audit (COA) flagged the Department of Health (DOH) due to its dubious transaction of P41 billion with the Procurement Service of the Department of Budget and Management (PS-DBM). PS-DBM used P3.82 billion of the transferred funds to purchase the DOH’s protective equipment (PPE) sets worth P1,910 per set from Pharmally. Pharmally earned at least P8.7 billion from pandemic items, despite only being incorporated in September 2019.
The acquired face masks cost as high as P27.72 per piece, while face shields cost as high as P120 per piece. The PS-DBM reasoned the items were expensive because the supply was reportedly scarce while the demand was high. On the other hand, the Philippine Red Cross procured face shields only at around P50 per piece during that time. Moreover, the demand for face shields should not be as meager as described, because the Philippines is only among the few countries that require both face masks and face shields. Furthermore, the supplies from foreign-owned Pharmally were the “least qualified” yet favored over Filipino manufacturers.
Pharmally was discovered to be connected with Duterte’s former economic adviser Michael Yang despite being a Chinese national. Two close associates of Huang Tzu Yen, the Singaporean chairman of Pharmally, work with Yang in other ventures.
Expensive they may be, the face shields cannot halt or even mitigate the rise of Covid-19 cases. The Philippines hit another record-high 21,261 new cases last September 16, Thursday.
Featured image courtesy of Lisa Marie David.
