District 2 Councilor Winston Castelo on Wednesday urged the Department of Health to consider the vaccination of children at the community or barangay level in Quezon City.
He is also proposing that the DOH pilot-test community vaccination in the current deployment of vaccines for children with comorbidity.
“The DOH would just have to make sure that the sites like basketball courts and village clubhouses are safe. It would also have to ensure the safety and potency of the vaccines,” he said.
Villages could enlist the help of volunteer doctors and nurses to screen children and do the vaccination as they did in the inoculation of adults, added Castelo, who is running for vice mayor in the May elections.
“They will not lack volunteers among their residents and their colleagues in the health-care sector,” he said.
“This will speed up the inoculation of our children who are of school age and who continue to pursue their schooling virtually or through the internet and their gadgets. It will lead to hastening face-to-face, classroom classes,” Castelo said.
The councilor said it would be safer for youngsters to get their vaccine in community-based centers rather than in hospitals, which are considered high-risk areas for contamination and infection.
“The DOH has allowed this for many adults, who refused to go to crowded vaccination sites and who got vaccinated in their villages. The government could inoculate more children by doing this as well for minors,” he said.
Parents and guardians who are afraid to go to hospitals could be enticed to take their children to nearby inoculation centers in their barangays, Castelo added.