National Task Force COVID-19 Chief Implementer and Vaccine Czar Carlito Galvez Jr. called the Bloomberg COVID Resilience Ranking ''biased'' for saying that "Philippines is still the worst place to be" .

"I think it's a biased comment," Galvez said in a press conference after the arrival of COVID-19 vaccines from Japan on Thursday.

The October Bloomberg Ranking showed the Philippines finishing 53rd and last place for the second month.

"With Delta, at least we did not experience running out of oxygen, we responded ... unlike other countries where they really run out of oxygen, crematorium," he added.

Galvez explained that Bloomberg and Nikkei Asia concentrated more on economic recovery. He expressed confidence that if the ranking will be made in the fourth quarter, there will be improvement in the rating of the Philippines.

"If they will analyze our response and also our economic performance during the second quarter and also the third quarter that is what they should see, how we respond and how our economic parameters behave during those times. If the parameter will be November or December maybe we will have a higher rating," he said.

"But for me I don't (pay much attention) to Bloomberg and Nikkei Asia because our response is concentrated more in saving lives and also saving the economy," he added.

Galvez said the volume of vehicles on the road and the number of people going to malls shows that the economy is recovering.

"I believe the volume of vehicles we now see in EDSA is similar to the volume of vehicles before the pandemic so meaning our economy now is recovering," he said.

"If you go to the malls we see that there are a lot of people now and it represents the opening up of the consumers' confidence and I believe by next month maybe we will have a better rating,": he added. Robina Asido/DMS