FORMER National Commission for Indigenous Peoples chairman Eugenio Insigne has asked the Supreme Court (SC) to nullify several government issuances that contained strict stay home directives for senior citizens as part of the government’s strategic measures to protect the elderly population from contracting the coronavirus disease (COVID-19).
In a 75-page petition for declaratory relief, Insigne called on the SC to stop the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-EID) from implementing what he described as “cruel and inhumane” measures against senior citizens like him.
He argued that such measures have no legal or constitutional basis, and as such, violate their rights.
“It is the height of injustice for senior citizens who have worked and sacrificed a lot for the country to be arbitrarily deprived of their right to enjoy lives in the twilight of their lives.
The days on earth of senior citizens are numbered. Every moment is precious,” Insigne, who served as NCIP chair from 2008 to 2010, said in his plea.
Insigne is also the president of the human rights group Center for People’s Rights and Participation.
Insigne said the quarantine orders also violate the right of elderly people to equal protection as they were singled out from among the general population despite the fact that many of them remain to be in good health.
“They are being deprived of their liberties simply because of a fear that they might catch the pandemic and infect other healthy Filipinos. They, the youth and others included in the quarantine are being sacrificed so that others might not be infected,” he said.
“This is unacceptable, ridiculous and illegal. It is an assumption with no empirical data, no scientific evidence to support it,” he added.
He said even the World Health Organization in its advisories said people of all ages, not just senior citizens, are vulnerable to getting infected with the coronavirus.
As for older people, he said the WHO stated that those with pre-existing medical conditions such as asthma, diabetes and heart diseases appear more vulnerable to COVID-19.
“Quarantining senior citizens is the exact opposite of improving the total well-being of senior citizens. Senior citizens are responsible enough to take care of ourselves so as not to get infected and in the process infect others. With age comes wisdom,” Insigne said.
Likewise, Insigne argued the quarantine measure violates their human rights as it “restricted their movements which resulted in the curtailment of their rights.
Further, he said the quarantine imposed on them caused “severe negative mental and psychological impact, making the cure worse than the problem” it was supposed to address.
With these, Insigne asked the SC to issue a temporary restraining order and or a writ of preliminary injunction to stop the execution and or implementation of the said quarantine measure and to declare them as invalid.
Aside from the IATF-EID, also named respondents in the plea are Health Secretary Francisco Duque III, Cabinet Secretary Karlo Nograles, Interior Secretary Eduardo Año, and Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea.
