Disparity or discrimination? Was the daily NAT regime for Filipinos based on science?

The SAR health authorities announced that from July 22, all Filipino nationals are mandated to take daily nucleic acid tests without exception. Any missing daily nucleic acid test will impact their health codes.

This policy announcement apparently is evidence-based and supported by the recently universal nucleic acid testing results. The health authorities claimed that Filipinos accounted for 9.5 percent of COVID-19 positive testing cases in the recent pandemic outbreak. 

They also infer that this ethnic group has a living habit of more intensive contact than their non-Filipino counterparts.

The Filipino community expressed their sentiments on social media and questioned whether this probably disproportionate infection figure ethically justifies the differential treatment.

Differential treatments are not new, and they could be legitimate. For instance, if the sentencing outcomes in criminal cases are caused by only legal factors while extralegal factors (i.e., variables that according to the law, cannot be considered in sentencing) are also being examined, then any racial or ethnical differences in sentencing will be legitimate, because race and ethnicity are not the reasons but the legal factors that cause disparities.

In my opinion, the implicit logic of this health policy is that the population of Filipino nationals is about twenty-seven thousand, which constitutes less than four percent of the Macau population. However, the approximately ten percent infection rate among Filipino residents is much higher than their population ratio.

 Suppose the Omicron variant coronavirus were to be randomly distributed in Macau. In that case, the infection rate of Filipino residents should be similar to their population ratio. Therefore, the current disproportionate inflection rate reflects an ethical disparity, and authorities should target Filipino nationals to diminish the contagious risk of coronavirus. 

Although the results of the universal tests appear to be factually valid to justify their policy change, the evidence is considered weak.

From a scientific perspective, the current figure is only a descriptive statistical result that depicts the infection outcome. However, the comparison base for the Filipino nationals is vague because these authorities fail to offer a complete picture of infection rates across all nationalities and residency statuses. What are the nationalities of the remaining ninety percent? Do other racial or ethical groups have high infection rates as well?

 What is the infection rate when comparing permanent residents and foreigners? Is nationality really the variable that can explain the high infection rate? Even if nationality is a statistically significant variable that correlates with infection outcomes, does it remain significant when accounting for other factors, such as occupations, income levels, and residential locations?

More importantly, the inferred reason for the disproportionate infection rate was that Filipinos are more likely to have intensive contact with others than their non-Filipino counterparts. 

To be fair, it could be true that Filipinos are more likely to have social contact with others, especially socializing with their racial/ethnical group, therefore increasing the likelihood of coronavirus infection. However, this disparity could also be explained by other reasons, such as adverse residential circumstances.

 Unfortunately, authorities did not provide further scientific evidence to support their speculation. As a result, whether intensive contact is the explanatory variable of this disproportionate health outcome remains unknown.

Without strong scientific evidence, Filipino nationals could argue that the governmental decision is not based on empirical evidence but on the authorities’ prejudice. Differential treatments based on race or ethnicity should be considered illegitimate, and therefore should be opposed. The government should investigate further and provide more robust scientific evidence before enacting such a policy to avoid damaging the image of minorities in our society.

Rielly Foster

Local resident