Philippines to receive at least 800K coronavirus shots from US stockpile in July — envoy
MANILA, Philippines — Manila is set to receive up to a million COVID-19 vaccines donated by Washington from its stockpile of excess jabs, Philippine Ambassador to the US Jose Romualdez said Tuesday.
The White House last month announced that it would be donating to the world at least 80 million coronavirus shots from its excess supply, adding that an initial 25 million jabs would be shipped out by the end of June.
It also said that 60 million of the shots in its stockpile are AstraZeneca jabs which are not being rolled out in the US.
"From the 80 million [vaccines to be donated], we are going to get something like 800 [thousand] to 1 million doses," Romualdez said partially in Filipino in a pre-recorded conversation with presidential spokesman Harry Roque.
He added that the donated jabs would be "either Moderna or AstraZeneca" and are "expected to be given to us by next month."
Romualdez said the Philippines will also receive jabs from a separate US donation of 500 million vaccines to the rest of the world.
READ: US buys half billion Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine doses for poorest countries
The White House in a statement earlier this month said it would buy half a billion vaccines developed by Pfizer-BioNTech and donate them to 92 poorer countries.
The World Health Organization-led COVAX facility, whose biggest donor is the US, will donate a total of 44 million vaccines to the Philippines.
In its latest fact sheet released May 8, the US Embassy in the Philippines said one in five Filipinos will be vaccinated with a jab from the COVAX facility.
Since the government began its inoculation campaign three months ago, it has administered 8,050,711 jabs, vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. said Sunday.
This translates to 2,096,901 people who have received the two doses needed for full vaccination. The figure represents only 1.9% of the population, remaining far from the 50 to 70 million targeted by officials this year to reach herd immunity.
— Bella Perez-Rubio
The national government has so far secured two official deals for COVID-19 vaccine supplies in the Philippines, one with Chinese pharmaceutical company Sinovac and another with the Serum Institute of India.
Watch this space for bite-sized developments on the vaccines in the Philippines. (Main image by Markus Spiske via Unsplash)
Health Officer-in-Charge Maria Rosario Vergeire says the general population may now get their second booster jab.
"We're just waiting for the release of implementing guidelines, then we'll start rolling out our second booster for the general population," she says. — Gaea Katreena Cabico
Amid questions on vaccines being administered, the Department of Health assures the public all doses are safe and effective as the “process of extending shelf life goes through thorough stability studies.”
“The government ensures that every vaccine that is injected with an extended shelf life has gone through studies, and is still safe and effective against COVID-19,” it adds.
Government must increase vaccination capacity across the Philippines in anticipation of a surge of COVID-19 cases caused by the Omicron variant of the corona virus, Sen. Risa Hontiveros says.
She says local government units and the private sector can work together to put up more vaccination centers and deploy more vaccination teams to get more people inoculated against COVID-19.
"The active COVID cases have nearly doubled in three days. The positivity rate is almost four times the ceiling set by the World Health Organization. Huwag na nating hintayin na sobrang lumala pa ang sitwasyon bago tayo gumawa ng paraan para mapabilis ang ating pagbabakuna."
FDA chief Eric Domingo says that its agency has given emergency approval for the use of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for children ages 5 to 11.
The United States immunized around 900,000 children aged five-to-11 against Covid in the first week the Pfizer vaccine was authorized for them, a White House official says Wednesday.
Roughly 700,000 more have made appointments at pharmacies, White House Covid coordinator Jeff Zients tells reporters.
"The program is just getting up to full strength," he says, adding most of the shots were given in the last couple of days alone. — AFP
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