Recto: Let local governments, firms buy own shots

The national government must allow local governments and private businesses to buy COVID-19 vaccines for their own use to expedite the rollout of its vaccine program and ease its burden, Sen. Ralph Recto said on Wednesday.

Recto filed a resolution urging the National Task Force Against COVID-19 to temporarily allow local governments and private companies to deal directly with drug makers whose vaccines had been granted emergency use authorization by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

The FDA has so far authorized just one vaccine for emergency use here, Pfizer.

According to Recto, several local governments and companies have expressed willingness to fund and procure vaccines for their constituents, employees and their employees’ dependents.

Temporary authority

“This intent of the [local governments] and the private sector is with the end in view of expediting the vaccine procurement process as well as easing the burden of the national government so that the latter can focus its vaccination program on those that belong to the priority, vulnerable and disadvantaged sectors of the population,” Recto said.

During the Senate investigation into the Duterte administration’s vaccine program last week, Recto questioned the insistence of the national government to control the vaccine procurement.

Recto said allowing the local governments and the private sector to procure their own vaccines was a regulatory matter that the FDA may temporarily allow during a state of national health emergency such as the COVID-19 pandemic.

In the hearings, health officials said vaccines with emergency use authorization could not be commercially distributed and that only the national government could procure these from the manufacturers.

But Recto said relaxing rules to allow local governments and the private sector to buy their own vaccines would hasten efforts to further open up the economy, and restore and create more jobs for the people.

“Vaccines are the breakthrough needed to prevent the spread of COVID-19, attain herd immunity among the population, and eventually [restore] the people’s confidence to go out,” he said.

Lawmakers in both houses of Congress are seeking more information about the government’s vaccination program, particularly the prices of the vaccines the COVID-19 task force is trying to procure.

Vaccine prices

But health officials and Carlito Galvez Jr., head of the task force, have refused to disclose the prices, citing confidentiality agreements with the pharmaceutical companies.

According to Galvez, disclosing the prices could make the drug makers lose confidence in the Philippines, which could lose 148 million doses of vaccines it is negotiating to purchase from the manufacturers.

Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon, however, said the government could not invoke confidentiality to withhold the information from the public because it was spending public money in buying the vaccines.

In the House of Representatives, Bataan Rep. Jose Enrique Garcia III, vice chair of the health committee that has opened an inquiry into the vaccination program, on Wednesday insisted on transparency.

“If the President gave [Galvez] the go-signal to reveal the prices, I think it would be better for everyone and our country [could] achieve its objective of getting the best price possible for us,” Garcia told a press briefing.

He said his committee would hold more hearings to get more information from Galvez, Health Secretary Francisco Duque III, and other government officials on the vaccination plan.

Ako Bicol Rep. Alfredo Garbin said confidentiality agreements were not more important than public health and national interest.

“The right of the people to information on matters of public concern should always be granted . . . This cannot [be denied because of] nondisclosure agreements,” Garbin said.

He stressed that the vaccine deals did not involve national security or trade secrets, but public health and national interest.

“What is at stake here is really public health and the money that is being used, [which is taxpayer money]. The ones to pay are our countrymen so they (government officials) cannot [invoke] the nondisclosure agreement[s],” Garbin said.

The two lawmakers spoke to reporters after learning that Sen. Christopher “Bong” Go had said President Duterte had given Galvez the go-signal to answer the senators’ questions about the government’s vaccination program.

The President, according to Go, had authorized Galvez to disclose the government’s vaccine deals to Senate President Vicente Sotto III.

Answer senators’ questions

Presidential spokesperson Harry Roque confirmed in a television interview on Wednesday that the President had given Galvez and Duque leave to answer the senators’ questions about the government’s vaccination program.

Roque said Galvez had asked permission from the President to skip the congressional hearings so he could resume negotiations with the vaccine makers.

“No, go to the Senate, continue answering questions, continue the way that you have been answering,” Roque said, quoting Mr. Duterte. “And if they become abusive to you verbally, just stand up and leave. If they cite you [for] contempt, I will come and [get] you.”

Roque said Mr. Duterte decried the “warlike” style of the senators, but allowed Galvez to explain the government’s vaccine program to them. —WITH REPORTS FROM JULIE M. AURELIO AND KRISSY AGUILAR