Govt urged to partner with private hospitals for bivalent vaccine purchase, administration
THE national government is encouraged to engage with private hospitals in the procurement and administration of Covid-19 vaccines, as well as in raising awareness on the dangers of a long coronavirus infection.
Members of the Advisory Council of Experts (ACE), led by Go Negosyo founder Joey Concepcion, made these suggestions on how the administration can proceed with bivalent vaccines and become more successful in its future inoculation initiatives.
“We remain the government’s ally in its vaccination efforts,” said the entrepreneurial czar, who earlier sent a letter to the Department of Health (DOH), which contains the recommendations from ACE members, experts’ insight and guidance from the private sector.
Procurement pact
THE country’s foremost authorities on medicine, public health, epidemiology, economics, research and data analytics who comprise the Council advised private hospitals and other health-care facilities to enter into agreements to procure bivalent vaccines.
These jabs can then be sold at cost and administered by health-care professionals as part of the hospitals’ corporate social responsibility efforts.
They, likewise, proposed that anyone can receive the vaccines, even those who may fall outside the priority-queueing system that was used in the government’s previous inoculation activities.
ACE members also sought to address the lack of Certificates of Product Registration of the bivalent vaccines and to help the health agency achieve higher vaccine accessibility and coverage, as well as help ease the government’s tasks and allow it to focus on the vulnerable sectors of society.
Past initiatives of the private sector include the August 2021 lockdowns to stem an impending surge in cases, as well the “A Dose of Hope” vaccine procurement program that secured millions of doses for the Philippines amid limited supply and regulatory roadblocks. It also resulted in initiatives that reopened businesses as the pandemic became more manageable.
Commitments gained
MANNY Pangilinan-led Metro Pacific Group’s hospitals have already committed to the plan to procure the vaccines and sell them at cost with a minimal administration fee.
Metro Pacific Hospital Holdings Chief Medical Officer Dr. Benjamin Co believes that other private hospitals can follow suit. He noted that it depends on their manpower capacity, vaccine storage and logistics, as well as approval from the DOH and the local government units.
According to him, the plan to tap private hospitals and clinics makes sense. He said: “Majority of those willing to get the vaccine are also those willing to pay for it. Patients also feel more comfortable getting vaccinated in the healthcare setting rather than having to do it in a mall or school or wherever else, because the facilities for monitoring postvaccination problems are better assured in a hospital than in a mall or makeshift vaccination center.”
They are, likewise, more confident of highly trained health-care professionals performing the inoculation on them and are assured of the quality of storage and handling of special vaccines like MRNA since doing so can be a challenge for hospitals with fewer resources, he added.
“Note that the MRNA vaccine will require storage at temperatures at less than minus 20 degrees Celsius, and once removed from storage, will be thawed at two to eight degrees Celsius, where the hospital/clinic should maintain this temperature,” explained Dr. Co, who is also chief of the Pediatric Infectious Diseases section at the University of Santo Tomas.
When initially thawed, the vaccines will be good for one month, but once the vial is opened, and its contents diluted, it is good only for the next six hours. He said: “This is one vaccine where proper storage is key to maintaining stability of the contents in order to retain its potency. Without the preservation of the proper cold chain and logistical preparation, it would be more wastage of vaccines.”
Widening vaccine coverage
WHILE vaccine wastage linked to low booster take-up has led to doing away with the priority sector system, Vaccine Expert Panel member Dr. Rontgene Solante believes that giving jabs to people who want it is but one of many strategies to increase coverage.
“There are pockets of strategies to increase vaccine coverage among the population at risk, focusing on the benefits of additional protection with bivalent vaccines,” he said.
The chairman of Adult Infectious Diseases and Tropical Medicine at San Lazaro Hospital urged that the private sector should require all employees with comorbidities to get the bivalent vaccines; incentivize vaccinations among senior citizens; and the general population must be aware of the dangers of a prolonged coronavirus infection.
“Long Covid…is now considered an important cause of morbidity due to long-term complications such as brain fog, chronic fatigue and mental health, which can affect productivity and quality of life,” he said.
Drs. Solante and Co agreed that bivalent vaccines can provide significant protection.
“It has better and broader protection against Omicron VOCS [variants of concern] and its subvariants, both in getting the infection and developing severe infection,” the former said, adding that bivalent boosters add 50 percent efficacy against severe disease from Omicron.
The latter offered that recently published studies revealed that the bivalent vaccines continue to show efficacy at protecting high-risk patients from hospitalization. Co said: “While we do not have a perfect vaccine at the moment as none of those in the market are transmission blockers, the vaccines work at making the disease less severe when we do get breakthrough infections.”
He added that bivalent vaccines’ efficacy must be considered in the light of the economic impact on health at a time of a pandemic.
“Lockdowns alone do not work at decreasing the risk of future surges. The virus continues to evolve and survive and co-exist with us. We need to remember that while we cannot be one step ahead of them, we can prevent the virus from [becoming] debilitating,” Co said.
“I think we’ve come to a point where people already know how to keep themselves from being infected. Our job now is to make sure they have the means to keep protecting themselves from severe illness and death,” Concepcion stressed.