Central Visayas receives 30K doses of AstraZeneca vaccines

|Photo from Radyo Pilipinas – Cebu

CEBU CITY, Philippines – Central Visayas on Wednesday, March 10, received its third shipment of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccines.

At 7:40 a.m., 30,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccines from UK-based pharmaceutical firm AstraZeneca arrived at the Mactan Cebu International Airport (MCIA).

This is the second brand of COVID-19 vaccine that the region received after CoronaVac by China’s Sinovac.

Dr. Mary Jean Loreche, spokesperson of the Department of Health in Central Visayas (DOH-7), said the vials will be stored in a cold-storage facility located inside their department’s compound along Osmeña Boulevard, Cebu City.

“These (vials) will cover all other healthcare workers in hospitals, city health, rural health units, and operations centers,” Loreche told reporters in a message.

With the arrival of AstraZeneca’s vaccines, Central Visayas has so far been allocated with around 54,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccines.

READ: ‘1,245 and more’ VSMMC workers OK with Sinovac

It can also be recalled that medical frontliners age 60 years old and above, who were not qualified to receive Sinovac, will be prioritized for the allocation of AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccines.

It has been a week since Central Visayas began its vaccine drive for healthcare workers following the arrival of a total of over 24,000 doses of CoronaVac.

Data from DOH-7 showed that as of March 9, more than 2,300 medical and hospital workers here have received their first dose of CoronaVac.

READ: DOH: 13 who got Sinovac vaccines had ‘minor, common’ adverse effects

/dcb