Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, March 19) — The Department of Interior and Local Government on Friday asked local governments not to spend on the development of their own contact tracing applications anymore as they can use for free the StaySafe app that will be fully rolled out soon.
“We will soon fully implement the StaySafe application and we don’t want to complicate the situation any further. It will be easier and more cost-efficient for LGUs to just use StaySafe instead of buying their own,” DILG spokesman Jonathan Malaya said in a statement, referring to the official contact tracing app of the national government.
But the DILG said LGUs with existing contact tracing apps could just integrate their tracking systems into the StaySafe.
Malaya said they are finalizing the terms of the formal turnover of StaySafe from app developer Multisys to the DILG, which is in charge of the country’s digital contact tracing efforts.
“Once fully turned over to the DILG, we will conduct a workshop for all LGUs who have existing contact tracing systems so that these can be integrated with Stay Safe,” he added.
The country still does not have a unified digital contact tracing system a year into the pandemic. This is because contact tracing apps of several LGUs and private firms are not linked to the government system, the DILG noted.
The Inter-Agency Task Force earlier said all data collected through digital contact tracing applications used by COVID-19 health facilities and local governments should be submitted to a centralized data repository, which will be linked to COVID-Kaya, the surveillance and contact tracing platform of the Department of Health.
