Mindanao LGUs gear up for vaccine rollout

ZAMBOANGA CITY — More than 6,000 frontline health workers and security personnel have registered for the scheduled vaccination rollout here by March.

This developed as other Mindanao local government units are also gearing up for the vaccine rollout.

Dr. Ivy Rozeth Saavedra-Iturralde, chief of the city epidemiology and surveillance unit, said the registration is a pre-vaccination process for those who belong to the first priority group to be given the Covid-19 shots.

The same process will also be undertaken for all who will be targeted for vaccination, Iturralde added.

Iturralde said the city’s rollout program mirrors that of the National Covid-19 Immunization Plan, and they have already identified the vaccine recipients.

Of the 6,189 who registered, are 3,286 health center staff, 2,094 personnel of public and private hospitals, 178 from the City Health Office and City Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office, 93 staff from isolation facilities, and 538 from other agencies like the Philippine National Police, Bureau of Jail Management and Penology, Bureau of Corrections, and Department of Social Welfare and Development.

Dr. Mary Germeyn Durias, coordinator of the Department of Health (DOH) Regional Immunization Program, said vaccines are expected to arrive in Zamboanga City late February and “we expect to inoculate the first priority group by March.”

Durias said they are tapping the DOH regional office, the City Health Office and rural health units for the storage of the vaccines which only require temperature ranging from 2 to 8 degrees Celsius.

Iturralde clarified that the expected vaccines will be coming from DOH, and not yet part of the jabs to be purchased by the local government’s P 100 million allocation for vaccines.

In Iligan City, the local government unit has targeted 3,000 front-liners and 30,000 senior citizens for the first vaccination phase.

The front-liners, composed of doctors, nurses and midwives, from public and private hospitals, clinics and birthing homes, will be inoculated in three days, said Dr. Belinda Lim, manager of the Emergency Operations Center.

Lim said that the recipients will be asked to register and be screened for eligibility. They are, however, asked to give their final consent just before the shot will be administered which means they can still refuse the jab.

In Pagadian City, Mayor Samuel Co has organized six teams of health care workers to oversee the vaccination in 54 barangays.

Co said they will have to bring the people into the City Plaza, the vaccination center, instead of them going to the villages as this might hamper the storage of the jabs.

“It is very difficult for us to travel the vaccines and maintain its temperature with the limited equipment, having only two chest refrigerators and limited number of ambulances,” Co explained.

The city hopes to inoculate 1,800 individuals per day with 40,000 in the priority list, among them contact tracers, health care workers, local officials, police and military personnel, national government officials and employees, and the senior citizens.

to complete the vaccination the nearest possible time which is initially limited to the frontline workers estimated to around 40,000 before catering the constituents of around 200,000.

“And to cast aside any doubt, the local officials in Pagadian will be among the first to have the vaccines as there were second thoughts from the people of accepting the vaccines,” Co declared.

JPV