CEBU CITY, Philippines—The Cebu City Health Department (CHD) has blocked three attempts of fully vaccinated individuals to get booster shots on Wednesday, October 6, 2021.
CHD Officer-in-charge, Doctor Jeffrey Ibones, said that they had to hold three individuals at the vaccination sites for attempting to get a vaccine jab for an American brand vaccine.
The three individuals were already vaccinated with Sinovac and they explained they needed to get a shot of a certain brand so they could travel abroad.
The countries they claimed to be travelling to would not accept Sinovac-vaccinated individuals.
However, Ibones said there are no booster shots available for fully vaccinated individuals yet as the city is still far from its hitting its target population of 700,000 people, or 70 percent of the city’s population.
“Wala pa gyod tay booster kay kulang paman atong bakuna. Wala pa ta nahuman og bakuna sa atong target,” he said.
As of now, most vaccines are donated as well, which means that the distribution of the doses depend on the requirements of the COVAX facility, on what priority group it can be used on.
Eventually, when the target population has been reached, there is a chance that booster shots will be given to the already vaccinated individuals.
As for the three individuals, their vaccination attempt was thwarted while the city seeks the guidance of the Department of Health in Central Visayas (DOH-7) as there is no policy dealing with attempts to get booster shots.
For now, the CHD appealed to the public to wait until next year for the booster shots.
He assured that the city government is fast tracking the vaccination program in order to inoculate more individuals.
As of the city’s vaccination progress, at least 361,999 first doses have been inoculated, 315,705 second doses have also been distributed, with 700,2900 total registrants to the vaccination program.
With the arrival of more doses in Central Visayas on Wednesday, October 6, 2021, CHD expects to get more vaccines as well for a continuous vaccination program.
/bmjo
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