Gov’t aims to do 500,000 to 1 million vaccinations weekly by April, May

MANILA, Philippines —  The government aims to increase the number of COVID-19 vaccinations by April or May to 500,000 to one million per week since inoculations will by then have expanded beyond healthcare workers, vSecretary Carlito Galvez Jr., the vaccine czar, said Monday.

“At the moment, we are a bit slow because we are inoculating healthcare workers,” he added, speaking in Filipino, during the pre-recorded weekly briefing of President Rodrigo Duterte.

According to Galvez, hospitals are limiting their vaccinations to 100 medical frontliners a day to make sure that they are well-staffed in case some of the workers would experience adverse effects.

The government is aiming to further increase vaccinations by June and July after the Philippines gets an “experience curve.”

For the first quarter of 2021, 98% — or 1,105,500 — of the currently available vaccines in the Philippines have already been deployed, Galvez said.

A total of 369,049 healthcare workers have so far been vaccinated, using the 600,000 CoronaVac doses and 525,600 AstraZeneca doses.

Galvez said the additional 400,000 CoronaVac doses donated by the Chinese government will arrive on March 24, and the 979,200 AstraZeneca doses might arrive sometime between March 24 and 26.

Meanwhile, the one million CoronaVac shots procured by the government will be delivered on March 29.

In April, 5.5 million vaccines are expected to arrive in the country, of which 1.5 million to two million will be from Sinovac BioTech, three million Russia’s Gamaleya Institute, and one million from the COVAX facility.

Meanwhile, over 8.9 million COVID-19 shots are expected to be delivered in May from Sinovac, Gamaleya, AstraZeneca, COVAX, and Moderna.

Galvez also said 11.5 million COVID-19 jabs from Sinovac, Gamaleya, Novavax and AstraZeneca will arrive in June.

[atm]