Metro Manila frontliners likely to get first crack at Sinovac shots — Galvez

FIGHT, NURSE A government nurse draws a smiley and #FIGHT on the back of an intensive care nurse at Philippine General Hospital in Manila. — LYN RILLON

MANILA, Philippines — The 50,000 COVID-19 vaccines developed by China’s Sinovac that will arrive in the country by February will most likely be inoculated to frontliners and health workers in Metro Manila, vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. said Tuesday.

Galvez said the vaccination set for next month will be a “dress rehearsal” for the national rollout of the vaccines.

“Ang target po sana natin ay ‘yung frontliners at saka health workers po natin pero idedetermine po ng IATF [Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases] at saka ng NTF [National Task Force against COVID-19] ang distribution nito kasi ito po ay tinatawag nating initial rollout, titignan po natin yung target area na bibigyan po natin nito,” he said in an interview over ABS-CBN News Channel.

(Our target are the frontliners and health workers but the distribution will be determined by the IATF and the NTF since this is our initial rollout, we will look at the target areas where to distribute these vaccines.)

“Most likely, dito po sa NCR [National Capital Region] yan,” he went on.

(Most likely, it will be here in NCR.)

The country already secured 25 million doses of Sinovac’s COVID-19 vaccine, 50,000 of which will arrive here by next month.

In a Senate hearing on Monday, Galvez said the first COVID-19 vaccine shots in the Philippines may happen by the end of February.

EDV