Dumb, dumber, dumbest

After completing the 21-day quarantine period and isolation in Caballo Island in Cavite, the 133 Filipino peacekeepers from Ebola-hit Liberia will finally be reunited with their respective families hopefully starting today. Since no one has manifested any symptoms of the deadly disease, both health and military authorities were confident none among them contracted the Ebola virus.

The peacekeepers, composed of 108 Air Force personnel, 24 policemen, and a jail officer, were placed on 21-day quarantine upon their arrival last November 13.

Dr. Lyndon Lee Suy, official spokesman for the Department of Health (DOH) earlier said all peacekeepers are in good health and have not shown any sign of Ebola virus infection. This, even as three of the peacekeepers got sick and sent authorities into fits of scare frenzy.

A few days after they were taken to Caballo island, a peacekeeper was airlifted to the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM) in Muntinlupa City due to fever and chilling. He was later diagnosed as suffering from malaria. Another peacekeeper was airlifted to a hospital in Quezon City after complaining of chest pain. The unnamed peacekeeper was brought to the AFP Medical Center for further examination. Later, another peacekeeper had to be isolated from the rest of his colleagues on Caballo because of sore throat.

Fortunately, none of these three cases was related to Ebola disease. No one else of the peacekeepers got sick until the end of the quarantine period yesterday.

Actually, they had previously undergone 21-day quarantine before they left Sierra Leone. Luy stressed, however, the quarantine after their return to the Philippines was an added precautionary measure to keep our country free from the Ebola virus. He echoed the government’s policy not to be complacent in dealing with Ebola.

But lo and behold!  A few days after assuming office as DOH “acting” secretary, former Iloilo congresswoman now undersecretary Janet Garin brought along Armed Forces chief of staff Gen. Pio Catapang to visit the peacekeepers in Caballo island. Up close and personally greeting the quarantined peacekeepers, Garin and Catapang joined them in Caballo island without wearing any personal protective gear.   

After much flak for pulling this stunt, Gen. Catapang admitted it was the DOH idea to visit the quarantined peacekeepers. It might be a case of political naïvette on the part of Gen. Catapang to go along with the DOH idea to visit them while still under quarantine. But it was a dumb move, to be blunt about it.

Garin, as a doctor (as I gathered she is an OB-Gynecologist), should have known better to be prudent. She reportedly sought to justify the visit to Caballo as a way to supposedly remove the public stigma quarantined peacekeepers as potential Ebola virus carriers when they are not. 

That’s precisely the purpose of the quarantine, to make sure not one of the peacekeepers may have brought back with him the deadly virus from Ebola-stricken Liberia. Whatever justification, a medical practitioner like Garin should be the last one to take chances on threats to public health.

But politics got the better of her. A card-bearing member of President Aquino’s ruling Liberal Party (LP), the “acting” DOH Secretary even dragged into her cheap political stunt the newly installed AFP chief of staff. So who’s dumb and dumber?

Stung by the bitter criticisms on the visit of quarantined peacekeepers, the leadership of the DOH and the AFP have now apparently gone their separate ways in handling this matter. In fact, the DOH has reportedly ordered last week the AFP to shut up and stop issuing statements regarding the quarantine of the four Filipino UN peacekeepers who were the last to return from Liberia. The four recently arrived peacekeepers, composed of two Air Force officials and two enlisted personnel, are still quarantined at the AFP Medical Center.

When DOH Secretary Dr. Enrique Ona went on official leave last October 28, President Aquino designated Garin to head the DOH on “acting” capacity. Gen. Catapang is more or less, also barely warming his new post. President Aquino appointed him AFP chief only last July 16.

A “heroes’ welcome” will all be accorded today to the peacekeepers now that they completed the 21-day quarantine period. Each of them will be awarded with the UN Service Medal for services rendered during their extended 11-month watch as UN peacekeepers in Liberia.

Yesterday, seven overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) who were previously employed as miners in Sierra Leone were directly brought to the Quarantine Office located near the Ninoy Aquino International Airport where they would undergo 21-day quarantine. They were also previously quarantined for 21 days in Sierra Leone but Philippine officials required them to be quarantined for another 21 days to make sure no Ebola virus ever enters our country.

Keeping vigilant against possible entry of the Ebola virus is the smartest thing Philippine officials should strive to do. The dumbest thing that certain Philippine officials did was to prevent the entry into the country of nine Hong Kong journalists who reportedly “heckled” President Aquino while he was attending the APEC summit in Bali, Indonesia last year.

This was another case of “dumb and dumber” act of Aquino administration officials involving Bureau of Immigration (BI) commissioner Siegfred Mison and the National Intelligence Coordinating Agency (NICA) headed by director-general Ariel Ontog.

The nine Hong Kong journalists figured in the foreign media interaction of President Aquino at the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Leaders’ summit held in Bali. Upon the recommendation made by NICA which classified the nine Hong Kong journalists as alleged “threats to public safety,” the BI blacklisted them from entry into country since June this year.

It only came to public knowledge when one of the Hong Kong journalists flew to Manila earlier this month but was barred entry. Naturally, the Hong Kong media reported this as related to the Philippine hosting of the 2015 APEC Leaders’ Summit. As the Philippines is the bulwark of press freedom in this part of the world, the BI-NICA booboo was a no-no. The two agencies lifted the blacklist but after public ridicule.

So these are the dumb, dumber and dumbest officials who are not funny at all but bungle their jobs all over the place.