The city of Borongan in Eastern Samar is requiring all persons within its borders transacting at any public and private establishment to present a QR (quick response) code to boost contact tracing.

After a series of technical reviews, name encoding, and data sorting, the city government officially implemented the QR code system on November 30 with more than 103,000 registered names as of December 4.

“This will boost our contact tracing to mitigate the spread of (the) coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19). The border control, business establishments, churches, schools, and government and private offices shall deny entry of those who do not have a QR code, valid identification card, and face mask and shield,” Mayor Jose Ivan Dayan Agda said in a statement on Friday.

Agda said everyone could generate a unique QR code through the SAFE Borongan mobile application for free.

Village officials have been directed to assist residents in activating their codes, while non-residents, including authorized persons outside residence, who intend to travel to the city, could secure them at the border control point or directly from the https://safeborongan.today/ website.

This would also serve as an additional requirement for returning residents, including locally stranded individuals and overseas Filipino workers, which would be issued by the city disaster risk reduction and management office, he added.

All establishments must register at the City Hall or through safeborongan.today@gmail.com, and provide a mobile phone to be used as a scanner.

The local government will impose a PHP5,000 fine on establishments that fail to register and implement the QR code system and another PHP5,000 fine plus revocation of business permit for the second offense.

Meanwhile, Agda assured that all information stored in the QR code system would be solely used for contact tracing.

“This would be used in lieu of the logbook system employed presently in border control points and establishments and would help us track, whenever necessary relative to contact tracing, the history of travel of a particular individual regarded as high risk,” he said.

As of December 4, the city has confirmed a total of 35 Covid-19 cases, including 29 recoveries and zero death, based on the monitoring report of the Eastern Samar provincial health office. (PNA)