Another shipment of China-made COVID-19 vaccines is set to arrive in Manila today, the Manila International Airport Authority announced Saturday.
The one million doses of Sinovac vaccines were scheduled to arrive at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport Terminal 2 via Cebu Pacific Air (CEB) flight 5J-671 around 7:30 a.m.
The shipment consigned to the Department of Health will be immediately transported to the chain cold facility of PharmaServ Express in San Roque, Marikina City upon arrival at the airport.
Meanwhile, the Commission on Human Rights lauded Saturday efforts of several local government units, which it said proactively worked to address vaccine hesitancy and encourage individuals to be inoculated against COVID-19 through vaccination drives and information campaigns.
CHR spokesperson and lawyer Jacqueline Ann de Guia said this after a non-commissioned Social Weather Stations survey recently revealed that only 3 out of 10 adult Filipinos are willing to be vaccinated, months into the national vaccine rollout.
Also, House Deputy Speaker Rufus Rodriguez on Saturday thanked the United States for deciding to donate part of its surplus AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccines to the Philippines and other countries.
The City of Bacolod also received an additional 10,000 vials of Sinovac’s CoronaVac jabs from the national government on Saturday.
The COVID-19 vaccines require refrigeration, a prerequisite that has posed a logistics challenge for many governments.
The World Health Organization earlier approved the Sinovac COVID-19 vaccine for emergency use—the second Chinese jab to receive the WHO’s green light.
The UN health agency signed off on the Beijing-based firm Sinovac’s two-dose vaccine CoronaVac, which is already being deployed in several countries around the world.
The Philippines has secured 25 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines developed by China’s Sinovac Biotech. So far, 5 million doses of CoronaVac have been delivered to the Philippines.
On June 7, CEB also shipped 1.5 million doses of Sinovac, which was the largest single shipment received by the Philippines to date. CEB chief strategy officer Alexander Lao said the airline management thanked the government for the continued trust and restated their intention to support the country’s fight against COVID-19 in any way it can.
“We look forward to picking up more vaccines from across the globe and aid in distributing across our widest domestic network,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Bureau of Customs Port of NAIA is also preparing for the arrival of other brands of vaccines this month.
NAIA district collector Carmelita Talusan said her office and the DOH recently discussed the Customs’ existing initiatives to expeditiously facilitate the importation of vaccines.
Shipments of COVID-19 vaccines (Moderna and Pfizer) made in the United States are also set to arrive in the Philippines this month.
LGU efforts
While these numbers are worrying, de Guia said the Commission found comforting the efforts of several LGUs that have sought to make vaccines accessible to the public through vaccination drives and information dissemination campaigns to address vaccine hesitancy and common vaccine misconceptions.
“The right to information on matters of public concern is crucially linked to the realisation of an individual’s right to health in times of a pandemic,” de Guia said.
“Enabling individuals to make sound decisions based on facts is the right way to decrease vaccine hesitancy among the public,” it added.
She said a testament to the importance of information dissemination as the high vaccine acceptance rate among constituents in Iloilo City.
The success of their vaccine rollout shows how well-informed individuals are in the best position to make decisions on their health and well-being, de Guia added.
The CHR also lauded efforts of several LGUs in ensuring accessibility of vaccines and equitability in distribution of such to individuals in priority groups, proving that they are not disenfranchised in receiving their doses.
De Guia said the launch of Quezon, Rizal, and Borongan City’s drive-thru Covid-19 vaccination sites, and Manila and Taguig City’s house house-to-house vaccination for bedridden residents, among others, go a long way in helping curb COVID-19 transmission and keeping number of cases down.
LGUs, such as the Quezon and Manila City government, in the past days, have posted record-breaking vaccination numbers of 16,649 and 22,066 respectively, she added.
“As we continue to fight this pandemic, every effort counts towards encouraging more people to get vaccinated while helping fight misinformation that leads to increased vaccine hesitancy.”
Rodriguez thanks US
“We are grateful for the donation, which will strengthen our diplomatic ties with the US,” Deputy speaker and Cagayan de Oro City Rep. Rufus Rodriguez said.
He said the donation would also give Filipinos more vaccine options.
“It will expedite the government’s vaccination program and hopefully the attainment of herd immunity or what the pandemic response task force calls ‘population protection’,” he said.
He said the donated COVID-19 shots would increase the country s vaccine supply.
“We should anticipate a surge in supply and prepare to scale up vaccination,” Rodriguez said.
The vaccine the US is donating is made by British-Swedish firm AstraZeneca and UK’s Oxford University. It is widely used in Europe.
The US is sharing an initial seven million doses to the Philippines, India, Nepal, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, Maldives, Malaysia, Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia, Thailand, Laos, Papua New Guinea, Taiwan, and the Pacific Islands.
American officials have said the donation would be made through the World Health Organization’s vaccine-sharing facility for “equitable distribution.”
In April, Rodriguez urged the US to donate its excess COVID-19 vaccine supply to the Philippines. At that time, only China’s Sinovac was available here.
“Our access to western-made vaccines will lessen our country’s dependence on China’s vaccines and give Filipinos vaccination options,” Rodriguez said then.
Bacolod gets 10K more vials
The fresh batch of vaccines arrived on board a Philippine Airlines flight from Manila at the Bacolod-Silay Airport in Silay City.
Mayor Evelio Leonardia thanked the Department of Health-Western Visayas regional director Emilia Monicimpo for her quick response to the call of the city government for more vaccine supply.
“We appealed and argued that due to the rising cases in Bacolod, the need to accelerate vaccination must also catch up,” he said.
Leonardia, Vice Mayor El Cid Familiaran, and the members of the city’s Emergency Operations Center Task Force held an emergency meeting with officials of the DOH-6 on Thursday.
Each vial of CoronaVac is equivalent to one dose.
Dr. Edwin Miraflor Jr., officer-in-charge of the City Health Office, said the new supply of Sinovac jabs will be administered to individuals receiving either the first dose or second dose.
The latest supply, which was immediately stored at the CHO’s cold room facility beside the Government Center, came after last month’s shipment on May 18, when the city government received 3,000 doses of the China-made vaccines also sent by the national government.
On April 30, Bacolod was able to obtain 7,500 doses; April 12 – 3,000 doses; and April 6 – 2,000 doses.