UCMed President Candice Gotianuy receives her first dose of Sinovac’s COVID-19 vaccine on March 10. Gotianuy led the ceremonial rollout of COVID-19 vaccines for UCMed’s healthcare workers. | via Morexette Marie Erram
CEBU CITY, Philippines – One of Metro Cebu’s largest medical institutions has pledged to donate coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccines to the public sector, including local governments such as Mandaue City.
UCMed President Candice Gotianuy announced on Wednesday, March 10, 2021, that they will be donating half of the COVID-19 vaccines that they ordered from British drugmaker AstraZeneca to the city.
Gotianuy made her announcement during UCMed’s ceremonial COVID-19 vaccination drive wherein no less than 50 medical workers participated during the first day of the rollout.
“We are donating half of (AstraZeneca) we ordered to the frontline workers of the government, to the public sector,” said Gotianuy.
“That is our way of helping the economy grow and our country to move forward,” she added.
On Wednesday, UCMed began its vaccination drive among its healthcare workers, making it the first hospital in Mandaue City to do so.
| Morexette Marie Erram
They received a total of 1,230 doses of CoronaVac, the COVID-19 vaccine brand of Sinovac, from the national government.
READ: ‘1,245 and more’ VSMMC workers OK with Sinovac
Aside from these, Gotianuy said they also ordered a total of four brands of COVID-19 vaccines for their medical frontliners.
These are CoronaVac, Moderna, Novovax, and AstraZeneca.
In a follow-up interview with reporters, Gotianuy said they ordered vaccines from AstraZeneca “good for 1,800 people.”
| Photo by JOEL SAGET / AFP
As to the arrival of their orders, UCMed said they are still awaiting further updates.
Cebu started inoculating healthcare workers last week, following the arrival of over 24,000 vials of CoronaVac.
On Wednesday morning, Central Visayas, where Cebu belongs, also received an additional 30,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccines from AstraZeneca.
READ: Central Visayas receives 30K doses of AstraZeneca vaccines
This shipment is part of the over 500,000 AstraZeneca vaccines that European countries donated to the Philippine government. /dcb