Palace welcomes ‘nurses-for-vaccine’ offer: If we can get more Covid-19 jabs, why not?

MANILA, Philippines — Malacañang has welcomed the labor department’s idea of acquiring more vaccine supplies by offering to deploy nurses and health workers to the United Kingdom and Germany.

This, even if it also said the Philippines already secured “enough” Covid-19 vaccines.

“Nag-order po tayo, sapat, sobra-sobra pa nga po, mga 90 million nga po ang in-order natin, sinobrahan na natin. Pero siyempre kung mas marami pang supply ang makukuha natin, bakit hindi?” presidential spokesperson Harry Roque said Wednesday when asked to comment on the “nurses-for-vaccine” bid of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) to the UK and Germany.

(We already ordered enough, in fact, more than what we need, around 90 million doses of vaccine. But if we could get more supplies, why not?)

DOLE has offered the UK and Germany exemption from the 5,000 per year limit on the deployment of Filipino nurses and other health workers in exchange for providing the Philippines Covid-19 vaccines.

Roque, however, quickly noted this was neither President Rodrigo Duterte’s idea nor was the chief executive informed of DOLE’s proposal to the two countries.

“Hindi po ito ideya ni Presidente. Ideya po ito ni [DOLE] Secretary [Silvestre] Bello at [Foreign Affairs] Secretary [Teodoro] Locsin na wine-welcome din natin because more is better than less,” Roque said.

(This was not the President’s idea. This was the idea of Secretary Bello and Secretary Locsin which we welcome because more is better than less.)

“The President was not informed of this proposal, as far as I know,” he added.

KGA