Prioridad umanong ikinokonsidera ng Senate committee on finance ang isyu ng COVID response ng gobyerno, sa harap ng binabalangkas na 2022 national budget.
Ayon kay finance committee chairman Sen. Sonny Angara napansin nilang maraming kulang sa proposed 2022 national budget, kung pag-uusapan ang pagtugon sa nananatiling problema sa pandemya.
“Funds are very tight this year because as noted by our colleagues during the DBCC, parang hindi COVID budget yung sinabmit po ng DBM because there were no funds for contact tracing, no funds for testing outside of the booster shot, no funds for the testing of the 12 to 17 year olds, no funds for contact tracing, no funds for the SRA, the Special Risk Allowance of our health workers,” wika ni Angara.
Sa pagdinig ng 2022 budget ng Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG), inungkat ni Angara na kailangang magkaroon ng balanse sa mga interes ng gobyerno at pagtugon ng pamahalaan sa pandemya.
Para sa mambabatas, bagama’t nauunawaan nila ang hiling na dagdag na pondo ng mga ahensya, mas mahalaga pa ring buhusan ng tulong ang pagpapalakas sa health response ng pamahalaan.
“With the understanding of the department and all the other agencies, those will be our utmost priorities going into 2022. Yung health response po ng bansa, because that’s our very existence under threat,” dagdag pa ni Angara.
