Tarlac uses app to monitor compliance to quarantine

BAMBAN, TARLAC –– The Tarlac government will make sure returning migrant workers and residents stranded outside the province during the Luzon lockdown are complying with their mandatory 14-day quarantine using a tracking application, Tarlac Governor Susan Yap said on Friday.

The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) Quarantine Tracker can track the movement of Tarlac residents, who were required to stay indoors for two weeks after finally coming home.

The application records a user’s location on a server. “We download the app in their smart telephones, or we provide a phone in case they don’t have one. We pin their home location using GPS (global positioning system) and fix a radius around their houses that will allow us to track the patient if he breaks quarantine,” Yap said.

Each isolated individual will be required to take random “selfies (their photographs) to make sure he or she did not leave the phones behind,” the governor said. Tarlac health workers would also make regular calls to check on their condition, she added.

Yap said the government is undertaking a trial run involving two patients before the app is utilized on all residents who were recently driven home.

Meanwhile, Tarlac City will be using the platform Smart Infocast in disseminating information through text messages, “to prevent the spread of fake news,” said Maureen Clemente, city public information officer.

“Not everyone has Facebook accounts. We are using all available media to send information,” Clemente said.

According to Chris Ivhan Areola, a representative of Smart Telecommunications, who is facilitating the local government program, said Tarlac schools have also tapped Smart Infocast for their flexible learning programs in the coming school year.

“It is a communication solution. Most people own mobile telephones [and can access the platform],” said Areola said in an interview.

LZB