The one sticking point for the country at this moment in time regarding the efforts to clamp down on COVID-19 is the issue of getting any or all of the available choices in vaccines formulated by pharmaceutical companies and laboratories around the world. While the quest for vaccines has been taken up not only by the national government but by the LGUs and private sectors, sometimes in a complex cooperative arrangement, from overseas international initiatives like COVAX are making sure as many nations as can be will have equitable COVID vaccine access. As the Philippines already joined this initiative, it is now assured of vaccines arriving in Q1 this year.
According to CNN Philippines the COVAX global initiative between the UN World
Health Organization (WHO), GAVI Alliance and the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness
Innovations (CEPI) has allotted a delivery of COVID vaccines to the Philippines
before the end of the first quarter for 2021. This was announced on Wednesday,
January 20, by the Department of Health (DOH). This comes as a culmination of
sorts for Philippine Vaccine Czar Carlito Galvez Jr. and his entreaties to the
COVAX facility for early vaccine access to the country, which has a COVID case
total approaching half a million.
In a follow-up statement this Thursday,
January 21, DOH spokesperson Maria Rosario Vergeire gave clarification on how
many doses of the COVID vaccine the Philippines might expect from COVAX. "They
have committed to provide us with 20% of our need for the population. But as
initial, they might be providing the first 3% only,” says Vergeire. That much
at least is sure to arrive in the country during Q1 2021. It should join the
around 145 million vaccine doses that the national government is angling to guarantee
in deals with various pharmaceutical sources within January.
COVID-19 vaccines generally must
be administered in a double dose, with a gap, for each person seeking
protection from the virus that has caught the world in the throes of pandemic
since last year. In addition to what the COVAX initiative can send, there is
already an initial batch of vaccines from Pfizer expected to arrive next month,
February. That one already has Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) clearance from
the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
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