The OCTA Research Group on Wednesday urged government to extend the second toughest quarantine level in Metro Manila and surrounding Bulacan, Cavite, Laguna and Rizal to maintain a downward trend in COVID-19 infections.

President Rodrigo Duterte later Wednesday is expected to announce new quarantine classifications for May. NCR Plus has been under modified enhanced community quarantine since April 12, following a 2-week return to the strictest lockdown level.

The reproduction rate of COVID-19 or the number of people infected by a patient, has gone down do 0.85, OCTA's Dr. Guido David said in a public briefing.

“The numbers are trending in the right direction,” said David, a mathematics professor.

An extension of MECQ will allow government to hire more contact-tracers and health workers, while opening up more health facilities, said OCTA Research fellow Ranjit Rye.

“Once we have 1 or 2 weeks of this, makikita natin na we will have a foundation to open up to GCQ (general community quarantine) na mas solid, solid enough for us to sustain for the next 3, 4 months. Tamang-tama, dadating na iyong mga bakuna natin,” Ryq said in the same briefing.

“Iyon po ang aming posisyon sa OCTA, na talagang hindi puwede po mag-transition sa GCQ as we speak kasi iyong trend po natin puwede mag-reverse,” he added.

(Once we have 1 or 2 weeks of this, we will have a more solid foundation to open up to GCQ, solid enough for us to sustain for the next 3, 4 months. It will coincide with the arrival of our vaccines. The position of OCTA is we really cannot transition to GCQ as we speak because our trend could reverse.)