44 out of 80 Cebu City barangays have zero active cases

Parts of Cebu City are seen in this photo taken on September 26, 2020. CDN Digital photo | Brian J. Ochoa

CEBU CITY, Philippines — The deputy chief implementor for Cebu City’s Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-MEID) welcomed Mayor Edgardo Labella’s move to provide cash incentives for barangays that could achieve zero active cases of the coronavirus.

Councilor Joel Garganera, who also heads the city’s Emergency Operations Center (EOC), said the reward would be ‘an added drive and a big step in achieving the city’s goal to be declared free from the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).’

“(But) the challenge there is how to sustain the gains they have achieved,” said Garganera.

Labella, on October 23, 2020, announced that the city government will be giving P100,000 as cash reward to every barangay that could achieve and maintain zero active cases of COVID-19 starting this November 1 until December 31.

It was part of the city’s attempt to accept and fulfill Environment Secretary Roy Cimatu’s challenge for Cebu City to achieve zero active COVID-19 cases.

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As of October 23, the EOC reported 44 out of the city’s 80 barangays that had not reported any new coronavirus patients in the past 14 days, and had zero active cases.

Of this number, at least 24 happened to be mountain barangays.

Barangay Luz, which was once tagged as a virus hotspot during the early stages of the outbreak here in Cebu City, was recently included in the list.

The EOC, however, requested not to disclose the names of the other villages that have zero in transmission as further verification was still being conducted. /dbs

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