OCTA to gov’t: Allocate 90% of COVID-19 vaccine supply to NCR

HOLY SITE The Sacred Heart of Jesus Parish Shrine in Kamuning, Quezon City, has been tapped as one of the vaccination centers in Metro Manila’s most populous city as the government seeks safe, spacious areas to speed up the country’s vaccine rollout.—NIÑO JESUS ORBETA

MANILA, Philippines — The OCTA Research group urged the government on Wednesday to deploy 90 percent of the vaccine supply to Metro Manila in order to significantly reduce the number of COVID-19 cases in the country.

Citing data from the National Task Force against COVID-19, OCTA Research fellow Fr. Nicanor Austriaco O.P. told the Kapihan sa Manila Bay forum that 65 percent of the vaccine supply in the country is being “prioritized” for Metro Manila, while the remaining 35 percent are distributed to the rest of the country.

He said that if all the vaccine doses will be deployed to Metro Manila, the number of active COVID-19 cases in the country would be reduced by half.

“So simply by increasing the percentage of vaccines we send to the NCR, we will be able to decrease the overall caseload of the pandemic,” Austriaco said.

“However, what we would like to do is we would like to recommend 90 percent [allocation] to the NCR and 10 percent to the rest of the country. Why is this? Because we have an obligation to vaccinate our senior citizens who are most at risk for severe COVID-19,” he said.

According to Austriaco, senior citizens compose 9.1 percent of all Filipinos nationwide.

“So 9.1 percent of Filipinos are 60 years and older, which is why we recommend 10 percent of the vaccines be deployed to the rest of the country to vaccinate our senior citizens, the medical frontliners who take up priority groups A1 and A2,” he added.

Austriaco pointed out that this framework will also help lessen the number of COVID-19 cases in other regions, noting that some cases are moving from Metro Manila to other areas.

“Think about it as the head of the snake. If you want to kill the pandemic, you have to cut the head off,” he said.

“If we are able to cut the head of the snake off in the NCR, you will see that the cases arising in the other LGUs would also decrease, simply because after two weeks there will be no new input of new cases from the capital region. We have to think of it as a whole country strategy to accelerate the end of the pandemic,” the research fellow explained.

Austriaco also cited the two target thresholds for vaccination, such as containment and herd immunity. For containment, 40 to 50 percent of the population should be vaccinated to bring down the attack rate to 1 per 100,000 population. For herd immunity, 70 to 80 percent of the population should be vaccinated to reduce the attack rate to almost zero.

On containment, Austriaco said 45 percent of the estimated 13.8 million Filipinos in Metro Manila would compose 6.21 million people, who will need a total of 12.42 million jabs for two doses.

Meanwhile on herd immunity, 70 percent of the population in the region would be 9.66 million adults, who will need a total of 19.32 million doses.

Containment of COVID-19 in Metro Manila can be achieved in four months if 100,000 doses will be administered per day; two months if 200,000 doses will be administered per day, and; one month if 300,000 doses will be used daily, according to Austriaco.

On the other hand, herd immunity can be achieved in Metro Manila in six months if 100,000 doses will be utilized per day; three months if 200,000 doses will be administered per day, and; one and a half months if 300,000 doses will be used per day.

“If we want to achieve herd immunity in the NCR by Christmas, the target has to be around 200,000 doses per day in the NCR,” Austriaco said.

Vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. earlier said a total of 3,001,875 COVID-19 vaccine doses have been administered in the country as of May 16. The figure is composed of 2,282,273 doses that were administered as the first dose and 719,602 that was given as the second dose.

Vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. earlier said a total of 3,001,875 COVID-19 vaccine doses have been administered in the country as of May 16. The figure is composed of 2,282,273 doses that were administered as the first dose and 719,602 that was given as the second dose.

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