International rights group calls out US for allowing hospitals to push millions into debt

by Noam N. Levey KFF Health News

‘A little progress’

“The latest report is that they were just tailed, unlike before [when] they were being blocked. So there’s a little progress there,” he said. “That is because we are continuing to talk to the Chinese government, President Xi (Jinping), in every way.”

Marcos said he had pressed the matter during his bilateral meeting with Xi in Beijing in January.

“Let’s not talk about the territory because we can’t decide [on] it now that we are talking. Let’s prioritize the fisheries, because I say, the people are innocent, why should we punish them,” he recalled telling China’s leader.

China says the fishing ban, which lasts from May to August, is intended to promote sustainable fishing and improve marine ecology. The Philippines has repeatedly protested the imposition.

The May 1 to Aug. 16 fishing ban covers waters north of the 12th parallel and two of the 12 fishing management areas of the Philippines — designated as Zones 5 and 6 by the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR).

These zones include waters surrounding the provinces of Antique, Occidental Mindoro, Palawan, Ilocos Norte, Ilocos Sur, Pangasinan, Zambales, Bataan, Pampanga, Bulacan, Cavite, and Batangas.

The ban roughly covers waters west of Palawan’s Busuanga Island all the way north past Panatag (Scarborough)

Shoal, also called Bajo de Masinloc off Zambales.

In 2019, Malacañang said the Chinaimposed fishing moratorium was against the sovereignty of the Philippines.

In May 2021, the DFA filed a diplomatic protest against China’s fishing ban in the South China Sea, saying the prohibition encroached into parts of the country’s EEZ and put Filipino fishers at risk of attack.

Bigger fish haul

A year later, the DFA filed a new diplomatic protest against the ban, which it said covered areas in the West Philippine Sea over which the Philippines enjoyed “sovereignty, sovereign rights, and jurisdiction.”

But China rejected the Philippines’ diplomatic protests. At a press conference in Beijing on June 1, 2022, a Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson said China could not accept the DFA’s “unwarranted accusation.”

On Tuesday, Marcos said the improving ties with China had already led to a BFAR projection of a bigger haul for Filipino fishers.

BFAR spokesperson Nazario Briguera said on Saturday that the West Philippine Sea had contributed 6 percent to the country’s total fisheries production, as of 2022.

Data from BFAR showed there were 376,733 fishers in the West Philippine Sea as of January this year.

—with a report from Inquirer researchn