Over 50,000 OFWs withdraw repatriation request after Covid-19 vaccination

MANILA, Philippines — More than 50,000 overseas Filipino workers have so far been vaccinated against Covid-19, Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III said Thursday.

He said about 50,000 to 60,000 overseas Filipino workers, who previously sought repatriation assistance from the Philippine government, withdrew their request after getting vaccinated.

“Of the about 500,000 na humiling ng repatriation, may umatras na mga 60,000, and they gave us the reason na umatras na sila, hindi na sila nagpaparepatriate dahil nabakunahan sila,” Bello said in a Laging Handa public briefing.

(Of the 500,000 OFWs who asked for repatriation, some 60,000 backed out since they hve already been vaccinated.)

 Mary Altaffer/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo

“So there were about more or less 50,000 to 60,000 of our countrymen na nabakunahan na,” he added.

This is excluding OFWs who are frontliners in England and Germany, he said.

More than 400,000 Filipino migrant workers have been repatriated since the Covid-19 pandemic broke out.

Around 550,000 OFWs have likewise been displaced by the pandemic.

As of Jan. 27, 13,897 overseas Filipinos in 84 countries have tested positive for Covid-19.

A total of  8,864 have so far recovered while 945 died