VM Rama says Cebu City will get more COVID-19 vaccines soon

Cebu City Vice Mayor Michael Rama.

CEBU CITY, Philippines — Cebu City should get additional doses of the vaccines when more vials will be allocated to Central Visayas.

Vice Mayor Michael Rama, the lead convener of the city’s vaccination program, said he talked with Doctor Jaime Bernadas, the regional director of the Department of Health in Central Visayas (DOH-7), regarding additional doses for the city.

Rama said that the DOH-7 is expecting at least 10,000 vaccines from the national government on May 1, 2021, and Bernadas assured him that Cebu City will get a portion of this allocation.

“Hopefully next week we can resume our roll-out. Later on, I will have meetings to just tell everybody that the sites should already be prepared,” said Rama.

If the doses will be of a substantial amount, the roll-out will focus primarily on the senior citizens because there are still many who haven’t been vaccinated yet.

Megacarousel

In the first week of May 2021, the city government will also be launching the barangay information drive for the vaccines to encourage more registrants to the program.

Rama described the information drive as a “megacarousel,” where not only health professionals will go around encouraging the public to be vaccinated, but also council members.

He said that while the vaccines remain limited, this gives the government time to raise awareness about these so that when they finally arrive, the public will be encouraged to avail of the shots.

The city government plans to simultaneously conduct the roll-out for senior citizens and people with comorbidities soon as well if the vaccine supply will be enough.

Rama encouraged to the public to get registered while waiting for more doses to arrive. He also encouraged those who already registered to be patient as the vaccines will arrive soon.

Read: CV gets 44K additional Sinovac vaccines, may start roll-out for seniors

/bmjo