SPEAKER Lord Allan Velasco has appealed to the Department of Health (DoH) and the Professional Regulation Commission (PRC) to enable and tap unregistered nurses as complementary manpower amid the shortage of health workers in the country.

“Since na-postpone din recently ‘yung nursing board exam, we can actually tap ‘yung mga supposedly magbo-board exam and use them as health workers,” Velasco said in a radio interview.

Velasco said the unregistered nurses can work under the supervision of a registered nurse or doctor through a special arrangement with the PRC.

“Aral na po ang mga ‘yan,” Velasco said, referring to expected takers of nursing licensure exam. “They are resources that we can actually use to help fight the pandemic.”

The PRC has decided to postpone this year’s first batch of the nursing board exam scheduled on May 30 and 31 upon the request of the Philippine Nursing Association due to the recent surge in coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) cases. The exam was rescheduled to November 21 and 22 this year.

DoH data show that as of April 25, a total of 17,365 health workers have been infected with COVID-19, 195 of them are active cases. The health department said 88 health workers have died, while 17,082 have recovered during the same period.

The DoH said that the surge in COVID-19 cases among health workers corresponded with the overall surge in infections nationwide beginning March this year.

Meanwhile, Velasco assured the public that the government is doing all it can to quell the surge of COVID-19 cases in the country.

He reminded everyone to do their part in minimizing the spread of the virus and to continue to observe minimum health standards even as cases have gone down from as high as 15,000 daily infections to more than 7,000 last Monday.

“Napapansin ko when I go around na there’s still a lot of people not following the protocols. Meaning, ‘yung pinaka-basic man lang, ‘yung pagsuot natin ng face mask. Kahit iyon man lamang ‘yung pinaka-basic,” said Velasco.

Velasco also called on the public not to let their guard down as the pandemic is not yet over.

“Kung kinakailangang magsuot ng face mask, magsuot po tayo. Hindi po porke’t bumaba na po ang COVID to 7,000 ay wala na po iyong COVID. Andyan pa rin po ito at mas infectious. Ang kinakailangan po natin ay magtulungan tayo not only for the country, but also for our families.”

Velasco earlier called on the Inter-Agency Task Force on Emerging Infectious Diseases to prioritize the National Capital Region Plus and other urban centers with high concentration of COVID-19 cases in vaccine allocation once all 1.7 million medical frontliners have been inoculated.