Cebu City will open its 9th vaccination site in a bid to achieve herd immunity the soonest.
CEBU CITY, Philippines – The national government is yet to release the official guidelines and give the go-signal for local governments to start inoculating the rest of the population.
But as far as the Visayas Vaccination Operations Center (VVOC) is concerned, those in Cebu are now ready to do the task.
“Our LGU (local government unit) vaccination centers are ready and they have prepared for an influx of persons,” said Dr. Mary Jean Loreche, spokesperson of VVOC, in a recent text message sent to CDN Digital.
Loreche als0 said the VVOC welcomed the decision of the national government to already inoculate individuals who were previously not qualified to receive free COVID-19 vaccines.
These included adolescents ages 12 to 17-years-old.
“This inclusion now of the general population for the vaccination program is another welcome development as this will hopefully bring us closer to the targeted herd immunity,” said Loreche.
“Our LGUs under the guidance of the VVOC understand the need to fast track the subgroup priority groups and we look forward to more people getting their vaccines,” she added.
Based on estimates by the VVOC, Cebu needs to vaccinate around 3.5 to 3.7 million individuals in order to achieve herd immunity.
As of September 30, over 1.1 million residents here have already received their 1st dose of the vaccine while 965,337 completed their second dose.
The VVOC is expecting Cebu to have 1 million fully vaccinated individuals during the second week of October.
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