‘Higher death rate not due to vaccines, depopulation theories

MANILA, Philippines — The Commission on Population and Development (PopCom) yesterday debunked accusations that the government has rolled out vaccines against COVID-19 to “depopulate” the country.

In a statement, PopCom executive director Juan Antonio Perez III said there was no truth to speculations that the rise in the country’s mortality is due to the COVID-19 inoculation which started in March 2021.

Perez underscored that the rise in mortality and drop in births in the country are caused by COVID-19 infections and should not be tied to depopulation theories.

He noted that more than one in 10 deaths in the country are “directly attributable” to COVID-19, which has resulted in 105,425 fatalities between April 2020 and October 2021.

Loss of lives from COVID-19 now account for 11.04 percent of all deaths in the country in the same period, making it the second leading cause of registered deaths since March 2020.

“The increase in deaths compared with previous years has been noted since July 2020. Comparing the first six months of 2021 with the same period of 2020, there was an increase of 88,191 deaths,” Perez said.

The PopCom chief said half of the deaths or 51 percent can be attributed to COVID-19 while the rest are due to ischemic heart disease, hypertensive disease and other illnesses – “the cases which also went up in that time frame.”

He maintained that accusations of “depopulation” by those opposing the COVID-19 vaccination are baseless.