The government made the "right move" in placing Metro Manila under a two-week hard lockdown, Presidential Adviser for Entrepreneurship Jose Maria "Joey" Concepcion 3rd said on Friday.

Concepcion made the statement after 10,623 new Covid-19 cases were reported in the country, and the Department of Health (DoH) confirmed that the more contagious Delta variant has been detected in all the cities of the National Capital Region (NCR).

For the third time since the start of the pandemic, Metro Manila is under an enhanced community quarantine (ECQ), this time to check the rise in infections attributed to the Delta variant, which experts say is at least 60 percent more virulent than the original Covid-19 strain.

In a statement, Concepcion said the number of new cases - the highest since April 17- has validated the decision to place the NCR back under the strictest quarantine measures.

"We made the right move. We heeded the advice of OCTA Research for the private sector to consider locking down. I am glad we did," Concepcion said.

"I am glad that our NCR mayors also joined us in seeing the real situation on the ground. We thank MMDA (Metropolitan Manila Development Authority) chair [Benhur] Abalos for his persistence and Health Secretary Francisco Duque and the rest of the IATF (Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases Resolutions)," he said.

The business sector and OCTA had lobbied for a "circuit breaker" lockdown to stem a spike in Delta cases.

The number of Delta cases jumped to over 200 in just a few days, prompting the government to tighten movement restrictions.

Concepcion reiterated that the ECQ in the capital region was "painful" but "necessary step" to protect the last quarter, which he said "is typically the most important for the corporate sector due to the holiday sale spike."

The Go Negosyo founder also pushed for an accelerated vaccination drive to protect more Filipinos against the coronavirus.

"We will now work closely with the MMDA chair and mayors and the IATF to make sure we succeed as we would like to see an end to lockdowns," Concepcion said.

"But that will rely on our ability to vaccinate with great speed. We hope those unvaccinated see the urgency to protect themselves and save our economy," he said.

On Friday, vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. said the government was aiming to jab more people during the two-week ECQ in Metro Manila to raise the number of fully vaccinated residents to at least 50 percent of the population.

In a radio interview, Galvez said Metro Manila and other areas under the toughest lockdown will be receiving millions of vaccine doses

He said he hopes to increase the daily vaccinations in Metro Manila to at least 250,000, and 150,000 a day in Regions 3 and 4.

Galvez expects that by the time the lockdown is lifted on Aug. 20, at least 4 million more people would have been inoculated.

As of Friday, 3,168,888 doses have been administered in Metro Manila.