Senior citizens, health workers in Marawi get second dose of COVID-19 vaccine
MARAWI CITY, Philippines — A big number of senior citizens and health workers in Marawi City and from nearby towns got a second dose of Sinovac COVID-19 vaccines during a three-day vaccination drive last week facilitated by the local government.
Physician Allen Minalang, with the help of Health Minister Bashary Latiph of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, supervised the three-day inoculation drive.
The Lanao del Sur-IPHO has just gotten more than 5,000 doses of Sinovac for Islamic preachers and Muslims slated to perform the hajj (pilgrimage) to Makkah, Saudi Arabia after the Ramadhan fasting season that started on April 13.
Latiph, a doctor, appealed on Monday to residents of the Bangsamoro region to ignore “fake news” spreading around and the misleading assertions by irresponsible Facebook users that COVID-19 vaccines can do more harm than good.
“We have to listen only to medical practitioners, particularly those in the Department of Health, the MOH-BARMM and the Integrated Provincial Health Office in each of the five BARMM provinces,” Latiph said.
Minalang and Gov. Mamintal Adiong Adiong Jr. have separately called on religious leaders and those who intend to perform the hajj in Saudi Arabia to have anti-COVID-19 jabs.
Adiong, as governor, is chairperson of the Lanao del Sur provincial disaster risk reduction and management council.
Minalang told reporters Monday their vaccine rollouts that commenced last March went on smoothly with the support of the PDRRMC and the MOH-BARMM.
Minalang said they are expecting the cooperation of the religious leaders in Marawi City and in Lanao del Sur with their April 19-21 vaccination campaign for constituents slated to leave the country for the pilgrimage.
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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