My mind tends to wander after eight months of writing about the coronavirus pandemic.
Health officials continue to release data that focuses on the total number of confirmed cases, which, at first glance, can be alarming.
But seriously, 22,806 cases for the whole island of Cebu, which includes the cities of Cebu, Mandaue, Lapu-Lapu and Cebu Province, out of a population of four million plus is nothing to write home about, especially when roughly 80 percent of the cases were mild or considered asymptomatic, based on the total number of recoveries.
Now let’s look at the figures released by the Department of Health (DOH) 7 on Friday, Dec. 4, 2020.
Cebu City, once dubbed the epicenter of the disease in the country, logged a total of 10,767 confirmed cases; Mandaue City, 2,664; Lapu-Lapu City, 2,627; and Cebu Province, 6,839.
My, my. It certainly does look a lot.
But the number of active cases tells a different story. And I think this is what authorities and the public should focus on. Not how many people were infected by the virus overall, but how many have it now. Because, let’s face it, 20,854 have already recovered and therefore should not be factored in the equation.
So the total number of active cases in Cebu City is 203; Mandaue City, 64; Lapu-Lapu City, 109; and Cebu Province, 204.
But we’re not even shown the whole picture because the DOH 7 doesn’t say how many of these active cases are mild or asymptomatic and how many are serious. Because if it’s the latter, then I and the rest of the public would understand why the government needs to continue to implement strict community quarantine measures to contain this highly infectious but not as fatal of a disease that we were meant to believe in the beginning.
Although, if you look around you, there really is no strict implementation.
Here in Cebu City, mask-less adolescents practice their skateboard skills on the sidewalk right outside the DOH 7 office. On J. Urgello in Barangay Sambag 1, children play on the street late into the night. In the downtown area and the Fuente Rotunda, beggars with infants and toddlers in tow accost passersby for change.
I can go on.
By the way, I am not saying the City Government is wrong for allowing this to happen. Quite the opposite, really. I think the City is being practical, having realized that it can’t keep everyone inside, especially minors and teens with all those raging hormones.
Right now it looks like it is trying to strike a balance between the perceived threat on public health and a flailing economy. But time is running out. Soon it will have to make a choice between the two. The Province already has.
Now where was I?