Doctors and nurses receive their first dose of COVID-19 vaccines on Tuesday, March 9, 2021 at the Perpetual Succour Hospital during the simultaneous vaccine rollout among private hospitals in Metro Cebu. | CDN Digital file photo (Morexette Marie B. Erram)
CEBU CITY, Philippines – Individuals here in Central Visayas, classified under A4 of the Philippine National Deployment Plan for COVID-19 vaccines, may receive their COVID-19 vaccine doses earlier than expected.
But only if majority of those, who belonged in the prior subgroups A1, A2, and A3, have received their first shot of the COVID-19 vaccine.
Dr. Jaime Bernadas, director of the Department of Health in Central Visayas (DOH-7), said the government was targeting the rollout of COVID-19 vaccines for A4 this June.
“Pero tan-awon nato karun, within the middle of May and daghan atong bakuna ug mahurot atoang A1 to A3, ang atong gitawag nga quick substitution, di gyud na malikayan makab-ot gyud ta sa sunod nga category,” Bernadas told members of the media.
(But let’s see if within the middle of May, and we still have vaccine supplies, and we have finished inoculating individuals under A1 to A3, then we will do what is called quick substitution since there is no choice but to move on with the next category.)
Bernadas was among those present during the ceremonial rollout of Central Visayas’ Pfizer-BioNTech COVID vaccine at the University of Cebu (UC) – Senior High School campus in Brgy. Sambag 1, Cebu City.
At least 60 individuals were given the first dose of the vaccine manufactured by US pharmaceutical giant Pfizer and German biotechnology firm BioNTech SE.
The DOH-7 top official also said that as of the moment, the region still has enough supply of COVID-19 vaccines to continue all inoculation schedules in different localities.
396,210 doses have been allocated to Central Visayas as of May 11.
Aside from Pfizer-BioNTech, other brands of COVID-19 vaccines shipped here are CoronaVac by China’s Sinovac Biotech, and AstraZeneca by British-Swedish drugmaker AstraZeneca.
Latest data from the Visayas COVID-19 Vaccination Operations Center (VVOC) showed that as of May 13, 737,898 people, under A1 and A2 categories alone, are eligible to receive free COVID-19 vaccines from the government.
A1 and A2 refer to medical frontliners and senior citizens respectively.
But the same report showed that only 45.8 percent of those tagged under A1 have completed their inoculation schedule against COVID-19, meaning they have already received the two doses of the vaccine.
For A2, only 22,499 have received their first dose as of May 13, translating to a success rate of 3.7 percent only.
The A4 cluster is next in line for COVID-19 vaccination after medical frontliners, senior citizens, and persons with comorbidities.
Transportation workers, market vendors, religious leaders, OFWs, and members of the press are among those eligible to be vaccinated under the A4 group./ with reports from INQUIRER.net
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