BY GILBERT P. BAYORAN
Negros Occidental may expect more Covid-19 vaccines this month, Provincial Incident Management Team head Zeaphard Gerhart Caelian said yesterday.
This came after vaccine czar Carlito Galvez announced that the Philippines expects to receive this month about 10 million vaccine doses, consisting of 5.5 million Sinovac, 2.28 million Pfizer, 2.28 million AstraZeneca, and 250,000 Moderna doses.
The Department of Health sent yesterday 23,800 Sinovac vaccine doses for the highly-urbanized Bacolod City and Negros Occidental.
Of the 23,800 vials, Caelian said 16,800 were allocated to Negros Occidental and 7,000 to Bacolod City.
Escorted by the PNP Highway Patrol Group and mobile police troopers, the 16 boxes of vaccine were fetched from the Bacolod–Silay Airport by the PIMT personnel, led by Caelian, and delivered to the cold storage facilities of the Provincial Health Office and the Bacolod City Government Center.
Bacolod also received 10,000 vials of Sinovac on Saturday.
City Health officer-in-charge, Dr. Edwin Miraflor Jr., said the 17,000 Sinovac doses will be administered to 8,500 Bacolodnons classified as priority groups under A1 or frontline healthcare workers, A2 senior citizens, and A3 or adults with co-morbidities, who are receiving both their first and second dose allocations.
Miraflor, CHO nurse Paulynne Sustento, who is also the cold chain manager, and CHO nurse Maricar Mana-ay received the fresh shipment of vaccines yesterday.
Mayor Evelio Leonardia had earlier requested the national government to allocate more vaccines for Bacolod, citing the urgent need to inoculate more residents amid the continued spike in local cases.
As of June 7, the Emergency Operations Center and the Covid-19 Vaccination Council have administered 37,838 doses of Covid-19 vaccines.
NO INCENTIVES
Governor Eugenio Jose Lacson, in an interview over DYHB Tatak RMN, meanwhile, said he is not inclined to the idea of giving incentives to those who will avail of the free vaccines.
“We are not thinking that way,” Lacson said. He said the vaccine is already a big incentive to protect and save people’s lives.*
