MANILA, Philippines — While there is no exact date yet when Covid-19 vaccines will arrive in the country, the government is “100% ready” to start the vaccination program, Malacañang said Monday.
Presidential spokesman Harry Roque said the World Health Organization-led Covax facility has yet to communicate the exact date of arrival of the first batch of vaccines in the country, but it has earlier said it will arrive mid-February.
“Sa ngayon po wala pa pong exact date but even now we are 100% ready to start the vaccination campaign,” he said in a Palace briefing.
(For now, we don’t have an exact date yet on the start of the vaccination but even now we are 100% ready to start the vaccination campaign.)
“If it arrives and we only need a day or two naman to start the vaccination, we will proceed. Basta tayo regardless of when it actually arrives, we will be ready by Feb. 15. In fact we’re ready now,” Roque added.
The Philippines is expected to receive 117,000 doses of Pfizer-BioNTech’s Covid-19 vaccine in mid-February, vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. earlier said, while over 5.5 million to 9.2 million doses AstraZeneca is expected by mid to late February.
Under the government’s immunization plan, health workers will be the first to get inoculated.
Health care workers from four Covid-19 referral hospitals in Metro Manila — Philippine General Hospital in Manila, Lung Center of the Philippines and East Avenue Medical Center in Quezon City, and Dr. Jose Natalio Rodriguez Memorial Medical Center (Tala Hospital) in Caloocan City — will be the first to get shots.