The Philippines is considering tapping Army reserve officers with medical training to substitute for exhausted frontliners tending to coronavirus patients, an official leading the country’s pandemic response said Monday.

Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana said the military this week would complete its estimate of the salary needed for 380 doctors and nurses, and some 3,000 medical aides and technicians who are all Army reservists, should they join the COVID-19 fight.

“Kung matutuloy iyong ating mobilization (if our mobilization pushes through), then we can employ these in Metro Manila especially and other areas that have high incidence of COVID infection,” said Lorenzana, the chairman of the National Task Force Against COVID-19.

Watch a snippet of his interview here.

ANC, Aug. 10, 2020