Slain Barrio Doctor, Others to Receive Health Exemplar Award

Wazzup Pilipinas!

Dr. Dreyfuss Perlas, the doctor-volunteer to the barrio killed by a gunman last March 1, will be given a posthumous award during the 3rd Health Exemplar awarding ceremonies to be held at One Canvass, Chino Roces, Makati City, on March 22.

The other awardees are Dr. Juan Sanchez, Dr. Richard Mata, Dr. Edgardo Ulysses Dorotheo, Dr. Iris Isip-Tan and the Mu Sigma Phi of the University of the Philippines College of Medicine. To be given special citations for their contributions to public health are Dr. Faith Guirnela-Go, Ms. Rosamy "Jing" Castaneda-Velasco and the Hepatology Society of the Philippines.

Health Secretary Paulyn Jean B. Rosell-Ubial will deliver the keynote address during the awarding ceremonies.

The H&L Health Exemplar Awards recognize individuals, institutions, governmental agencies, non-governmental organizations, media entities and others who have effectively carried out activities and programs that promote a specific aspect of a healthy lifestyle and health-promoting behavior which includes diet and nutrition, exercise and fitness, smoking cessation, relaxation and stress control, hygiene and cleanliness. The awardees' contributions are recognized for the positive health-promoting and health-seeking behavior they have achieved in their respective communities or the entire population.

Noted medical specialists from the Medical Advisory Board (MAB) of the Health and Lifestyle (H&L) magazine compose the Board of Judges. The H&L MAB is composed of prominent physicians who are virtual who's who in the country's medical field.

This year's board of judges is composed of Dr. Ramon Abarquez, Jr., Dr. Augusto Litonjua, Dr. Adolfo Bellosillo, Dr. Abdias Aquino, Dr. Bien Cabral, Dr. Willie Ong and Dr. Bibly Macaya.

The posthumous award for Dr. Perlas honors his patriotism and devotion to duty as a doctor-volunteer to help our marginalized countrymen in Northern Mindanao who are in dire need of medical assistance. Despite the danger to his life, he was among the first ones to participate in rescue and medical missions during natural calamities. He was also prompt to volunteer his medical assistance during ambushes and clashes with insurgents in their area.

Dr. Sanchez, a noted surgeon, is the brain behind the innovative Mobile Surgical Unit for which he has gained the moniker as the “Doctor on Wheels." He has spearheaded medical-surgical missions in many underserved areas in the country, performing various types of surgeries for free. Consistently doing these missions monthly for more than ten years now, he and his fellow volunteers have helped transform the lives of thousands of poor Filipinos.

Dr. Mata has helped curb the rise in dengue cases in the country with his nationwide health education seminars and workshops for health workers and community leaders. He has conducted training for dengue coordinators on how communities can effectively do initiatives to prevent the rising incidence of dengue in their respective communities.

With his unstinting advocacy against smoking, Dr. Dorotheo has been actively involved in various global campaigns for tobacco control, which has made significant milestones in public health not only in the Philippines but in neighboring countries as well. He was one of the outspoken advocates for the sin tax reform law as well as the inclusion of graphic health warnings in cigarette packages.

A specialist in internal medicine and endocrinology, Dr. Isip-Tan has given true meaning to the role of a physician as a health educator and ‘influencer.’ With her expertise in health informatics, she has adeptly harnessed social media to promote health literacy and positive health-seeking behavior in the public.

The first and biggest medical sorority in the Philippines and in Asia, the Mu Sigma Phi Sorority is recognized for its various projects serving indigent patients. It has also promoted a positive health-seeking behavior in the public with its healthy lifestyle and various health education campaigns such as the Women Empowerment and Literacy through Health Education (WEALTH).

The Hepatology Society of the Philippines is cited for effectively addressing the lack of public knowledge on Hepatitis B which has led to misconceptions causing stigma for those who carry the virus, and to delayed treatment leading to liver cancer and end-stage liver disease. This was achieved through their scientific researches, extensive continuing medical education programs (Liver Caravan Symposia), and campaigns for newborn vaccination against Hepatitis B.

Dr. Guirnela-Go is cited for the public education forums she has helped organize in her hometown in Oroquieta City, as well as other towns in Misamis Occidental, under the auspices of the Foundation for Lay Education on Heart Diseases, (FLEHD) Inc. Without fanfare, she has conducted follow-up programs in her city to further spread awareness on cardiovascular diseases and promote primary prevention at the grassroots level.

Popular broadcast journalist Jing Castaneda will be given a special citation for her strong advocacy for a healthy lifestyle and other health-promotion programs. As a veteran news personality and celebrity mom, she has extended her influence and that of her network to help people in dire need of medical assistance, particularly children who are physically abused, maltreated and require treatment for their medical ailments through the Bantay Bata (Child Watch) of which she is the program director. Through her television program (Salamat Dok), she also helps address various family issues on health, empowering the public with basic knowledge on preserving health and wellness.

NAITAS' Travel & Trade Show (NTTS) is Back!

Wazzup Pilipinas!

The waiting is soon over to get your best tour and vacation packages just in time when the coming summer comes in full swing. The NAITAS’ Travel & Trade Show (NTTS) is here anew. This year’s NTTS offers up to 80% discount on your outbound and inbound travel needs as well as on tourism allied products and services when you make bookings and purchases onsite. On the other hand, the “B2B Travel Networking” feature of NTTS 2017 provides a venue to local and international tour operators and travel agencies to nurture business relations or initiate profitable deals. All these happen on April 7, 8 & 9 at the SM Mall of Asia SMX Convention Center.

NTTS is a modest initiative of the National Association of Independent Travel Agencies, Inc. (NAITAS), one of the country's biggest travel and tourism association, in partnership with the Department of Tourism and Tourism Promotions Board Philippines. 

 It is co-presented by the country’s flag carrier---Philippine Airlines (PAL) ,China Bank---the first privately-owned commercial bank in the Philippines and PLDT Smart SME Nation. NTTS has been supported all this time by the Tourism Infrastructure and Enterprise Zone Authority (TIEZA), Air Asia, Cebu Pacific, Duty Free Philippines, Organique, Philippine Amusement Gaming Corporation (PAGCOR), and Hannah’s Beach Resort & Convention Center. This premier travel event is powered by PLDT Smart SME Nation, Amadeus, Sabre, Kyocera, TAG Cash and 52 Thomas.

To know more, NTTS can be reached at ntts.eventmanager@gmail.com, (63)977.6394830 (Globe), (63)949.4181479 (Sun) or 0922 8906612 www.naitas.com.ph.

Palo Alto Networks Boosts Cybersecurity Offerings with PAN-OS 8.0

Wazzup PIlipinas!

The Philippines remains to have the fastest GDP growth in Asia with economy growing by 6.8% in 2016 according to the Philippine Statistics Authority. It also is at 3rd spot for having the largest bitcoin users, and with 47 million active Internet and Facebook user, and is at 2nd place for having the most Millennials in ASEAN who are digital natives that embrace the use of online or the Internet integrated with their daily tasks.

Thus, there is no surprise that many Philippine companies are also on their way to include cloud computing among their technology so they could keep up with the rest with regards to being both locally and globally competitive.

With the continuing leap of many businesses towards cloud computing, the threat of cyber attacks becomes more critical especially for companies with large networks. Every Systems Administrator's objective is to keep away any form of unauthorized or suspicious intrusions that could endanger both the data and system of the company they are working for.

One can strengthen the prevention by having a complete visibility of their system or network, reduce the attack surface by proper identification of significant areas to watch out for and protect, and to prevent both known and unknown (zero-day attacks) threats.

Quick response to zero-day attacks could help save a company from losing valuable information to hackers who aim to sabotage companies by using malware, exploits, and new variants, or use the information they would acquire for negative purposes like selling them to competitors.

Palo Alto Networks, led by Kevin Chin, Country Manager of Philippines, Indonesia, Vietnam together with Vincent Oh, Director of System Engineering, and Marc Lainez, Solutions Architect based in the Philippines, recently conducted a press briefing to launch their company's biggest product update that offers 70 new cloud features for its next generation security platform.

“The advancements made to the latest version of PAN-OS 8.0 address some of the key challenges customers in the Philippines face in their digital transformation journey. We provide a holistic approach in support of policies and programs in place to prevent successful cyberattacks. We help secure cyberspace so cloud computing can flourish unimpeded and all stakeholders can realize the promises of digital transformation.” says Kelvin Chin, Country Manager of the Philippines, Indonesia and Vietnam.

Palo Alto Networks areas of innovation include cloud security, multi-method threat prevention, management at scale, new hardware, credential theft prevention which is unique for them and not available from other technology solutions providers.

Below is the official press release from the event so you would get most of the technical details regarding the new features.

Palo Alto Networks Extends Safe Application Enablement and Breach Prevention from the Network to the Cloud with Enhancements to its Next-Generation

Security Platform

New PAN-OS 8.0, Aperture Features and Virtual Firewall Models Enable Customers to Safely Embrace New Cloud Infrastructure; Achieve Security at Speed and Agility of the Cloud

Palo Alto Networks, the next-generation security company, today announced advancements to its Next-Generation Security Platform that extend the ability for customer organizations to safely enable applications, including SaaS options, content and users regardless of location; prevent successful cyberattacks; simplify security operations; and securely embrace the cloud.  

Security demands have evolved as new requirements and risks have been introduced, especially as organizations expand their IT architecture from traditional networks and data centers to private and public or hybrid cloud deployments.

The addition of SaaS application usage to the mix, and the need to secure all these architectures against ever-increasing, sophisticated threats and adversary techniques being used to gain access to assets and data regardless of where they are located – the network, in the cloud, or in SaaS applications – and organizations have a multitude of complex security and operational challenges to address to prevent cyber breaches and achieve the cloud speed and agility promise.

Traditional detect-and-respond approaches, cloud-only security capabilities, and siloed point products offer limited functionality and lack threat context from the network edge or at the user interface. This makes these options ineffective and administratively burdensome; causes holes in an organization’s security posture; and hinders operational agility, especially in cloud deployments.

The natively engineered Palo Alto Networks Next-Generation Security Platform addresses all these challenges by delivering rich context from multiple points across all IT environments to provide consistent levels of visibility, management and security controls regardless of data location – from the network to the data center and private cloud, in the public cloud, or within SaaS applications.

Building upon existing capabilities in the platform, new advancements included in the Palo Alto Networks platform operating system, PAN-OS® version 8.0, Aperture™ SaaS security service, and new VM-Series virtual firewall models address security needs by extending protections from physical networks to the cloud, further simplifying security operations and infrastructure, and ultimately helping organizations establish an effective and consistent security posture.  

Palo Alto has integrated more than 70 new cloud and SaaS features in this next-generation security platform. The PAN-OS 8.0 feature highlights include the following:

·         Expanded security for public and private clouds, including optimized workflow automation features and integration with native cloud services that ensure the same security measures for a customer's physical environment can be easily applied to Amazon® Web Services, Microsoft® Azure®, or any other cloud. The cloud capabilities enable secure, scalable and resilient cloud-centric architectures with easy orchestration and management for operational agility. 

·         New SaaS application security capabilities, including enhanced visibility and interactive dashboards, new reporting, and automated features like instant quarantine and data sharing limitations. These features increase security, real-time monitoring and compliance enforcement capabilities on cloud-based assets. Additionally, extended application support (Slack and Secure Data Space), language support (German and Japanese) for DLP and machine learning, as well as new data centers in Europe (Germany) and Asia (Singapore), expand global usage and protection options and address regional data privacy needs.

·         Increased performance and three new VM-Series virtual firewall models that have been added to the existing virtual firewall family. The VM-Series, which now includes the new VM-50, VM-500 and VM-700, delivers industry-leading performance options ranging from 200 Mbps up to an industry-leading 16 Gbps of firewall throughput with App-ID enabled to deliver predictable performance in cloud deployments and address a variety of use cases from virtualized branch office to data center and service provider deployments.

Additional threat prevention, management and hardware highlights are also available with the introduction of PAN-OS 8.0. See these related press releases:

·         Palo Alto Networks Raises Bar with New Threat Prevention Capabilities for Its Next-Generation Security Platform

·         Palo Alto Networks Delivers Industry-first Capabilities to Prevent Credential Theft and Abuse

·         Palo Alto Networks Expands Range of Next-Generation Firewall Devices with New Hardware and Virtual Appliances

PAN-OS 8.0 in the Philippines

According to the 2016 Cloud Readiness Index published by the Asia Cloud Computing Association, the Philippines ranked #9 but scored only 3.5 in cybersecurity posture to effectively combat cyberattacks. A robust cloud computing outlook for the Philippines got an even bigger push when the recently-established Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) adopted a cloud-first policy, making the Philippines one of the first countries in the world to do so.

“The advancements made to the latest version of PAN-OS 8.0 address some of the key challenges customers in the Philippines face in their digital transformation journey. We provide a holistic approach in support of policies and programs in place to prevent successful cyberattacks. We help secure cyberspace so cloud computing can flourish unimpeded and all stakeholders can realize the promises of digital transformation.”

-          Kelvin Chin, Country Manager of the Philippines, Indonesia and Vietnam

PAN-OS 8.0 is now available globally to customers of Palo Alto Networks with a current support contract. 

To learn more about the Palo Alto Networks Next-Generation Security Platform, visit: https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/platforms.html.