Sorry, Spongebob. Indoors is not a “magical place, with magical charms” anymore. I mean, you only spent a couple of hours there versus our whole damn year.
But hope is scarce and we’ll take what we can get. And maybe this isn’t the day. During a briefing last night, Dec. 3, the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) revealed that the country’s quarantine life would most likely continue the whole of 2021. This is taking into account that vaccines against COVID-19 would likely be available by then.
“The projection for next year assumes that we will have a modified GCQ (general community quarantine) or a relaxed version of that for the rest of the year because clearly, we cannot go back to normal life without the vaccine,” said Karl Kendrick Chua, acting socioeconomic planning secretary of NEDA, in a report by GMA News.
“(B)ecause of news that a vaccine will be available this year and widely available towards the end of next year, we will likely see a lifting of all quarantine fully by 2022,” he added.
According to Inquirer, COVID-19 policy chief implementer and vaccine czar Carlito Galvez, Jr. believes that the Philippines has not been late in buying vaccines, although he admitted that there have been hindrances. He is confident that we can score at least 50 million doses of vaccines by 2021.
“I believe we are not late yet because we have ongoing negotiations with different leading (pharmaceutical) companies,” Galvez said on Wednesday.
So yeah, joke’s on us for waiting for a 2021 miracle, huh? But you know, it’s another 365 days after all—anything can happen. (’Til then, please send virtual sanity packs our way, thank you very much.)
Read more:
We’re beyond 100 days in quarantine. How are the jeepney drivers?
Spotify calls us out for listening to emo this quarantine
No excuses, Pasig pulls through with free COVID-19 testing
Still from “Spongebob Squarepants”