The Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Diseases (IATF-EID) has made initial discussions on the use of face shields to complement wearing of face masks in public, particularly in low ventilation settings, such as public transportation.
Presidential Spokesperson Secretary Harry Roque, who is the concurrent IATF Spokesperson, mentioned the use of face shields for the National Capital Region (NCR) and Region IV-A, where transmission of COVID-19 cases is high, during President Rodrigo Roa Duterte’s Talk to the People Address on Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) aired this morning, July 31, 2020.
IATF, in its Resolution No. 60-A, directed the local government units of NCR and Region IV-A, to implement stringent enforcement of minimum public health standards starting August 1, 2020.
The IATF, in its Omnibus Guidelines, defines minimum public health standards as “public health measures that do not involve vaccines, medications, or other pharmaceutical interventions, which individuals and communities can carry out in order to reduce transmission rates, contact rates and the duration of infectiousness of individuals in the population to mitigate COVID-19.”
Wearing of masks, washing of hands, and the practice of social distancing are part of the minimum public health standards.
Studies have shown that wearing of face shields, in addition to wearing of masks and physical distancing, would further reduce virus transmission in low ventilatilation settings.
