McDonald’s Philippines to provide free RT-PCR tests for NCR restaurant employees
McDonald’s Philippines, in partnership with the National Task Force Against COVID-19 (NTF), has committed to conduct free RT-PCR testing for close to 20,000 active restaurant employees across over 200 McDonald’s branches across Metro Manila.
“Ever since McDonald’s opened its doors in the Philippines, safety has always been part of our operating culture, and we have always placed people first,” said Margot Torres, Managing Director, McDonald’s Philippines.
“When we launched our M Safe campaign, we knew that we had to constantly find ways to demonstrate to our employees our commitment to keep them safe so that we may keep our customers safe,” Margot Torres continued. “We believe that when they know their status, they will be able to keep their loved ones, their fellow employees, and our customers, safe.”
Since September 28, 2020, McDonald’s began testing employees from both company-owned and -franchised owned stores in Palacio de Maynila, Pasay – one of the four mega swabbing facilities (MSFs) NTF has set-up in the metro.
A media briefing event was also conducted last October 16, 2020 at Ynares Sports Arena in Pasig City as the company officially announced its testing efforts. Through this partnership, McDonald’s was also able to donate at least three swabbing booths to NTF, which was turned over to the city of Pasig that was able to expand these free tests to about 1,000 tricycle drivers from Pasig City and to other residents of the Rizal province.
National Policy Against COVID-19 Chief Implementer Secretary Carlito Galvez, Jr. praised McDonald’s for its proactive efforts to protect their workers and by extension, their customers from health risks.
Galvez shares, “Ito ay napakagandang halimbawa na sana, pamasiran din ng ibang mga nasa business sector na (this is a very good example to replicate by others in the business sector) they have to protect their own front-liners, at the same time, they can protect the [confidence] of consumers do dine-in.”
McDonald’s Philippines operates following global standards on food quality and safety. These include the regular sanitation of all work areas for employees and customer areas, and regular hand washing of store employees. When the pandemic hit, the company increased the frequency of regular hand washing among its store employees from every hour to every 30 minutes and increased the frequency of sanitation of work and customer areas.
“Now with this initiative under the M Safe campaign, all of our active restaurant employees get access to the RT-PCR test, which is considered the gold standard in COVID-19 testing as it is by far the most reliable of in detecting the presence of the SARS-CoV2 virus,” Torres said.
“McDonald’s has always taken safety seriously; it is part of our global core operating culture. We go beyond compliance set by the government as we seek ways to enhance our guidelines and our protocols to keep our employees, partners, and, especially our customers, safe,” Torres adds.
Customers are encouraged to also send their feedback and suggestions on M Safe by sending an email to [email protected].
INQUIRER.net BrandRoom/MS
ADVT
