After the extreme enhanced community quarantine conducted by La Trinidad, other Benguet towns followed suit in implementing their own extreme ECQs.
The towns of Itogon, Tublay, Kabayan, and Bokod also issued orders for the implementation of the extreme ECQ in their respective areas.
Itogon Mayor Victorio Palangdan placed the municipality under extreme ECQ on March 31 to April 3.
“The Itogon police and barangay officials will be stricter in guarding checkpoints, implementing curfew hours, and letting people leave their homes using the home quarantine pass. Barangay officials, supervised by Itogon police, are given authority to impose tougher travel restrictions,” Palangdan said.
Itogon residents going to Baguio are considered persons under monitoring, which required them to practice self-quarantine for 14 days when they go back to the municipality.
Exemptions are given for health workers and emergency responders, storeowners, farmers, cargo drivers of food and non-food items, and skeleton workforce of businesses offering basic services and commodities.
Also excluded are banks, money transfer services, power, energy, water, and telecommunication supplies and facilities, BPO and hotel employees, and pastor/priests to conduct funeral rites.
Tublay Mayor Armando Lauro also placed the town on extreme ECQ from April 1 to April 14.
Window hours for all establishments will be from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. with exceptions for the DOERS multipurpose cooperative and grocery and pharmacies, which shall be open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
All establishments shall be closed during Sundays to give owners time to disinfect their premises. No travel permits shall be issued during Saturdays and Sundays except for medical or emergency purposes.
Kabayan Mayor Faustino Aquisan said there is a need to maximize protection and mitigation measures by limiting the interaction of stakeholders within and outside the town when he placed the municipality under extreme ECQ starting March 31 until 6 p.m. of April 13.
In Bokod, checkpoints were established at Ambangueg, Daklan by members of the municipal inter-agency task force against Covid-19.
Bokod Mayor Thomas Wales Jr. added that one of the Covid-19 positive in the Cordillera had a travel history in Barangay Bila, and therefore there is a need to intensify the restriction and monitoring of movements of all residents and no travel passes must be issued during the EECQ.
Travel ban for all types of vehicles and individuals in Bokod is set from 8 p.m. to 5 a.m. except for medical and emergency services for all the municipalities of Benguet. – Ofelia C. Empian
