A vaccinator administers a COVID-19 vaccine on a Quezon City resident. Photo from Philippine Daily Inquirer/Niño Jesus Orbeta
MANILA, Philippines — The Department of Health (DOH) has spent around P400 million for the hiring of more than 3,000 vaccinators whose contracts will end in June.
Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire assured, however, that the DOH has already secured funding to rehire the vaccinators once their contracts end next month.
“Nakapaghire na tayo ng additional vaccinators, at dito, gumastos tayo ng about almost P400 million to hire more than 3,000 vaccinators and their contracts (will) end in June,” she said in an online press briefing on Friday.
(We have hired additional vaccinators, and we have spent P400 million for the more than 3,000 vaccinators we have hired whose contracts will end in June.)
Vergeire said that aside from hiring additional vaccinators, the DOH has been coordinating with the private sector that offered to let their healthcare workers help in the COVID-19 inoculation.
She noted that the healthcare workers from the private sector will help scale up vaccination in the country.
“So dito natin masasabi na sapat naman pati ang ating sites at healthcare workers na magbabakuna sa ating mga kababayan,” the health official added.
(We can say that we have enough vaccination sites and healthcare workers who will administer the vaccines to our countrymen.)
Data from the National Task Force (NTF) against COVID-19 as of May 18 showed that the country’s current seven day average of daily vaccinated individuals is now at 108,540.
Vergeire noted that the seven-day moving average was only at 1,000 to 3,000 doses administered per day when vaccination started in March, which increased to around 30,000 doses two to three weeks after the first rollout.
The country has so far received over 7.7 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine. Of this number, more than 7.6 million doses or 99 percent have already been distributed to 3,850 vaccination sites nationwide.
Of the country’s current vaccine supply, nearly 3.3 million doses have been administered, composed of 2.5 million doses given as first dose and 786,528 provided as second dose, according to the NTF data.