(Manila, Philippines–20 April 2020) — Going through quarantine checkpoints in the entire Metro Manila area is about to become easier for frontline personnel and other people authorized to travel under the COVID-19 stay-at-home restrictions.
To achieve this, the Department of Science and Technology, the Department of Information and Communications Technology and the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management Emerging Infectious Disease (IATF-MEID) are expanding the RapidPass Project, an online registration service for frontliners, to cover the whole of Metro Manila.
“Your company’s support to the government to realize the full operationalization of RapidPass will affect millions of Filipinos who will benefit from the decongestion of Quarantine Control Points, as well as the health of PNP personnel at the control points as they will now be able to exercise social distancing with the use of RapidPass,” said DOST Secretary Fortunato dela Pena in a letter to PLDT Chairman and CEO Manuel V. Pangilinan who approved Smart’s support for the initiative.
The first phase of the project covered the main checkpoints at the boundaries of Metro Manila, which helped authorities to set up RapidPass lanes in the highways leading to and from the metro area.
To expand RapidPass coverage to all of NCR, the DOST needed an additional 340 mobile phone to bring the total count to 540. These phones will be used to equip with three devices each of the 180 checkpoints which daily process an estimated 1 million people in Metro Manila who are allowed to go out of their homes for work or other essential purposes.
“We are grateful to the DOST and IATF for giving us the opportunity to help make life easier for our frontliners as they provide services that are so vital to the public,” said Jane B. Basas, SVP & Head of Consumer Wireless Business.
