MANILA, Philippines — Fresh shipments of COVID-19 vaccine doses arrived in the country on Friday, October 1. Over 3.5 million doses were delivered through by the global COVAX facility. The arrival of the vaccines comes at a timely manner, as the country continues to speed up its vaccination program.
A total of 883,350 Pfizer shots arrived through the WHO global COVAX facility. WHO representatives and US Embassy Chargé d’Affaires Heather Variava were among those who welcomed the shipment. Variava stated that an additional 5.5 million doses from the COVAX is set to arrive in the next few days.
So far, through the COVAX facility and government-procurement, around 11 million Pfizer doses have been delivered to the country. The Philippines is set to receive more vaccines from the US government as part of US President Joe Biden’s promise to deliver more shots to low and medium-income countries.
Bulk of the vaccine distribution will be allocated to the National Capital Region and the southern cities of Cebu and Davao. The IATF is hopeful that these three regions will be able to vaccinate at least 80% of their eligible population by the end of October.
“We will now consider NCR and Region 4-A and Region 3 as one geographic location. Kasi we can see na ‘yung economic activity, hindi natin pwede paghiwalayin“
Vaccine czar carlito galvez jr.
Galvez further noted that it is important ramp up vaccination in Regions 3 and 4 due to their close proximity to NCR. He is hopeful that vaccination rates in these two regions will be at par with NCR by the end of November.