PGH chief to lead recipients of Sinovac’s Covid-19 vaccine

Facade of the UP – Philippine General Hospital. (Image from the PGH website)

MANILA, Philippines — Philippine General Hospital (PGH) Director Dr. Gerardo “Gap” Legaspi will be the first among workers in the hospital to receive on Monday the CoronaVac Covid-19 vaccine developed by China’s  Sinovac Biotech.

“The first recipient will be our director, Director Gap Legaspi, and then  there are some other like Dr. Edsel Salvaña, he’s an infectious disease specialist and then there are other consultants here whom we think have probably a lot of convincing power,” Dr. Jonas del Rosario, PGH spokespersonsaid in an interview on ABS-CBN News Channel.

Del Rosario, a Covid-19 survivor, was supposed to receive the first coronavirus vaccine but he said he was informed that the amount of his antibodies against the SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes the disease, is still high.

“They tested my antibodies again a couple of days [ago] and it was quite high. They told me you can wait, you are not the priority at this time,” he said.

Del Rosario said there are 100 identified vaccinees at the PGH this Monday. 

He also said that there are almost 6,000 vaccinees in PGH, regardless of the vaccine brand.

“Regardless of the vaccines, we have about almost close to 6,000 recipients. That would be from the doctors, nurses, down to support staff, administrative personnel, janitorial services, all of those about 6,000. So far we have as an allocation of 1,000 [doses] for Sinovac at least for the first few days just to see and if the numbers go up, we will ask for more,” he added.

The donated 600,000 doses of the Sinovac vaccine from China arrived in the Philippines on Sunday, with the doses transported to the PGH, Lung Center of the Philippines, Dr. Jose N. Rodriguez Memorial Medical Center and Sanitarium (Tala), Veterans Memorial Medical Center, Philippine National Police General Hospital in Camp Crame, and Victoriano Luna Medical Center early Monday morning.

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