The “general population” of the Philippines will be vaccinated by August, vaccine czar Secretary Carlito Galvez, Jr. said in a publicly broadcast government meeting last night.
Galvez said that the government will be done inoculating those belonging to the A1 (healthcare workers), A2 (elderly), and A3 (people with comorbidities) categories in July. Those under the A4 category (economic workers) and A5 (indigents) will be vaccinated by June, he said.
“In August, when the vaccines arrive, we can do a public vaccination by August because we have enough vaccines,” Galvez said.
Read: From ‘BFF’ China: 400,000 donated Sinovac vaccines arrive in Manila
The vaccine czar said last month that general vaccination will start in April or May, but he changed his tune this month and said it will begin in July. It remains to be seen if his promise will come true this time.
Meanwhile, at least 500,000 CoronaVac vaccines have arrived in Pasay City this morning, bringing the total number of the Sinovac jabs to 3.5 million. Out of this number, 1 million were donated by the Chinese government.
Galvez, who welcomed the vaccines, said that the CoronaVac will be distributed immediately to areas that have recorded a high number of COVID cases.
CoronaVac doses which had arrived on April 22 faced distribution issues because Sinovac failed to submit the necessary paperwork on time.
The Philippines is facing vaccine procurement issues with President Rodrigo Duterte saying that he had no idea when jabs will arrive. However, his adviser Joey Concepcion said that about 1.7 million AstraZeneca doses will be delivered two months from now, but these will be used by local companies that have purchased them.
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