A Mandaue City senior citizen receives his one-dose Janssen vaccine. CDN Digital photo | Mary Rose Sagarino
CEBU CITY, Philippines – Central Visayas is targeting to administer a total of 40,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccines in the next round of special vaccination days.
This time, their primary target will be elderlies and individuals with co-morbidities.
The Department of Health in Central Visayas (DOH-7) on Monday, March 28, 2022, revealed their preparations for the upcoming special vaccination days which will span up to three days, starting this Wednesday, March 30, until Friday, April 1.
Dr. Jaime Bernadas, director of DOH-7, said they will push through with their plans to do house-to-house vaccination for senior citizens who are yet to get inoculated against the infection.
“This will be our final ditch to eliminate, or not conquer, COVID. As such, we will be protecting those vulnerable, which we are preparing, to help them escape the burden of COVID hospitalization and severe disease,” Bernadas told reporters in a press conference.
Based on DOH-7’s data, Central Visayas remains one of the regions with the lowest COVID-19 immunization rate, at 50.9 percent, among individuals age 60 years old and above. They are classified as A2 in the national government’s vaccination drive.
“We are lagging behind in terms of coverage compared to other regions. We are one of the lowest among regions in terms of coverage for our senior citizens,” said Dr. Van Philip Baton, DOH-7 medical coordinator for Emerging and Re-Emerging Infectious Disease Program.
There are roughly 640,000 senior citizens in Central Visayas, according to the latest government figures. Health officials needed to vaccinate at least 70 percent of this population to reach their goal.
Baton said they have identified at least 23 localities in the region that needed help in boosting its immunization coverage rate among senior citizens.
Of this number, 12 are from Cebu province.
These are the towns of Balamban, Bantayan, Barili, Daanbantayan, Dalaguete, Pinamungajan, San Fernando, San Francisco, Tuburan, and the cities of Carcar, Danao, and Toledo.
“These 12 LGUs (local government units), combined, will be able to deliver (additional) 38,500 senior citizens, both for the primary and secondary doses. And they will account for 50 percent of the total provincial target,” Baton said.
Based on recent data from DOH-7, Cebu province’s COVID-19 vaccination rate for the A2 group currently stands at 39.8 percent.
“We’re not saying that the other LGUs that are not part of the 12 will be ranking up (in the list of localities with high immunization coverage). We’re just focusing our efforts to assist these LGUs because of the high volume of A2 targets,” added Baton.
As a result, DOH-7 deployed additional healthcare workers, vaccinators, and social mobilizers in these localities to educate and convince senior citizens to get the jab. They are also the ones expected to conduct the house-to-house vaccination.
“Actually, much of our working class is already vaccinated but there’s danger in senior citizens lagging behind (in the vaccination drive)… Hopefully, we can deliver our target,” Bernadas pointed out.
/bmjo
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