Here’s something that’s become clearer now: Duterte’s rhetoric—that one that’s been sold as a personality quirk, that cracks inappropriate jokes, that same one that shifts towards violence every chance it gets, that dismisses important issues by saying it’s fake news, that evades critical demands of nation by delivering empty soundbites and/or talking about the drug war over and over again, or his perceived enemies like media and America—this Duterte rhetoric is government’s communications policy.

Sure, it might not be written anywhere, but it is the rhetoric that Duterte’s men and women have used, especially when faced with questions from a populace now unable to contain its dismay and disgust. Keeping us preoccupied with soundbites also means we lose precious time for piecing together the parts of the various crises we face.

We see this strategy being used for the COVID19 crisis.

From the start, our question was: how are we testing the Chinese mainlanders who entered this country as the news blew up about the virus, and before the travel ban? It’s a valid question, especially for anyone how has seen our neighborhoods changed by the massive influx of Chinese workers, whether for POGOs or blue collar jobs.

But instead of keeping at this, we got distracted with questions of travel bans and our relationship with China, not to mention racism and xenophobia. Duterte dismissed the virus because there is no more AIDS in the Philippines (a total lie), and because we are resilient (totally irrelevant). He threw in some strong statements against those taking advantage of the paranoia and hiking up the prices of face masks, and that took over the news cycle for a while.

On January 30, the Department of Health (DOH) confirmed that a Chinese woman was tested positive for COVID19, but it left out one bit of information: that she was traveling with a companion. They also faced the public with the vague narrative about the woman traveling from Wuhan, to Cebu, Dumaguete, and then Manila, where she was diagnosed.

On February 2, DOH announces that a Chinese man diagnosed with COVID19 had died. We are told two things about this man: he was the companion of the woman who tested positive, and he was confined in the same hospital as the woman on January 25. These are two important things that we could’ve been told on January 30, but weren’t. The death of the Chinese man was also fashioned as non-COVID19 related, because they insist, he had died of severe pneumonia, and not the virus.

This way of handling information is the kind of communications we’ve gotten out of Duterte’s DOH from the moment this news broke. And this does nothing to allay our fears, neither does it serve anyone but this government, its supporters, and propagandists, which has been allowed to claim (at least until recently) that their efforts have been great, their containment system fantastic.

Criticism is seen as offensive, as a Dr. Edsel Salvana on Twitter who says: “Im not being defensive. Im presenting facts. I am on the frontline. I know we are working hard. To say that we aren’t doing our job when we are exhausted and in harms way is really insulting, especially if you dont have any evidence to counter. Pls. be careful, medyo masakit.” (March 5, 10:45AM)

This was his general response on Twitter after people raised the fact that Australia had released information that one of their nationals who tested positive for COVID19 had come from the Philippines. His response to that news report was that it was “racist” (March 5, 10:17AM), his response to people who were sharing the news from Australian media was that they were spreading “unverified information,” that they were contributing to “the noise,” and that we should all just go to the DOH website which is updated daily. To Dr. Salvana, daily updates from DOH is equal to transparency.

But transparency in terms of DOH data is not the only thing the public needs right now. We need to know that there is, has been, a plan. We need questions answered, and not in the arrogant way that Dr. Salvana does using his 280-character space on Twitter. We need more than being told that unless we are doctors who have studied this for decades, then we have no right to ask questions or to criticize how unsafe this government has made us feel. You want the public to cooperate? Stop talking down to this public. You want us to trust government? Start answering our questions.

On the upside, one must be thankful for what the good doctor has done, arrogance included, because it reveals that the Duterte rhetoric is strong in this government, and just like Duterte and many of his men, Dr. Salvana is unapologetic about it. But let’s look at what he has revealed in his tweets:

(1) “Some wannabe epidemiologists w/ no medical training are saying that unless we test 60k like South Korea, we can’t possibly know we don’t have more #COVID2019. We.Closed.Our Borders.Early. We did 600 tests. Travel ban = much less PUIs. Singapore did 1300, are they incompetent too?” (March 1, 7:24PM)

(2) “The reason we didnt have to do more <COVID19 tests than the 600 already done> is because we closed our borders. We are also looking for clusters of pneumonia.”  (March 5, 10:33AM)

(4) “PUI <persons under investigation> definition is related to travel from China + symptoms? Less travel = less PUIs. Ban came in place late January.” (March 6, 9:48PM)

(3) “<The testing of 600 people> are in accordance with WHO protocols. We test according to epidemiologic risk and clinical probabilities. Singapore tested 1300 and they contained. We don’t blindly test. WHO is on board and agrees.” (March 7, 7:17AM)

So the Philippines tested 600 people based on World Health Organization protocols. Those people were considered as persons under investigation, which is defined to be people who (a) traveled to China, and (b) showed relevant symptoms. Sounds good.

But how does WHO and DOH, and this government in general, address the fact that Chinese nationals arrived in droves in the country in January alone, before the travel ban? And that they continued to arrive even after the travel ban was declared?

On March 5, at the Senate Inquiry on money laundering and the online gambling businesses of Chinese nationals in the country, it was revealed that in January 2020 alone, 128,000 Chinese mainlanders arrived in the Philippines. In February, 2,254 Chinese nationals were still allowed entry despite the ban.

This brings us back to the first question all of us had in our heads when news broke about COVID19 early in the year: did we test any Chinese mainlanders at all? Did we make the effort to trace their whereabouts and test as many of them as possible? That’s 128,000 legal arrivals—imagine how many more arrived illegally.

Here’s the thing: you can be following WHO protocols, and you can be doing all your science right, and certainly the scientists and science workers of DOH are putting in the work and should be lauded. But NONE OF THAT MEANS we cannot ask questions, especially ones that have yet to be answered. None of it also addresses the very basic crisis that is here: that we have played unwilling host to thousands of Chinese nationals, and as it turns out, government doesn’t care about the business they do here, illegal as it is. Certainly they do not care to offend Xi Jin Ping by actually tracing and testing these foreigners.

According to Dr. Salvana, this is how we should use social media in the time of Covid19 and DOH’s (and his!) Duterte-style communications strategy: “If you can’t verify, dont share. It contributes to the noise. Because there is a good chance it is fake or misinterpreted. Too much misinformation out there.”

But that’s not the way social media works. Not at a time when government refuses to answer our questions, not in the face of a president who believes he can punch a volcano to make it stop, and that we will survive a virus because we are resilient. And certainly not with government officials asking private entities not to make public their employees who test positive for COVID19 because all information should pass through DOH.

You want us to trust this government and its handling of this public health emergency? Show us you are worthy of that trust. Be upfront with information. Stop looking down on us and denying us our right to ask questions. And goodness gracious: take down that damn tiktok account, DOH. That just reminds us about why you don’t deserve our respect.