House OKs 11.16-B supplemental budget for Dengvaxia ‘victims’

The House of Representatives has approved on third and final reading the proposed 11.16-billion supplemental budget that will cover possible medical expenses that may be incurred should children injected with Dengvaxia fall ill.

With all 231 congressmen

present in Tuesday’s session voting in the affirmative, the Lower Chamber approved House Bill (HB) No. 7449 that consolidated legislative proposals of Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez, Reps. Alfred Vargas (PDP-Laban, QuezonCity); Johnny Pimentel (PDP-Laban, Surigao del Sur), and Aurelio Gonzales (NP, Pampanga), among others.

HB 7449 mandates that the amount of 11,161,710,000 be exclusively spent for programs and projects of the Department of Health (DOH) that will deal on medical issues that might affect over 800,000 persons, mostly schoolchildren, who were injected with Dengvaxia, an anti-dengue vaccine.

The amount represents the money that French firm Sanofi Pasteur, maker of Dengvaxia, returned to the government through its local distributor, ZuelligPharma.

Vargas and Gonzales said the reallocation of the amount given by Sanofi Pasteur will help guarantee that the ill-effect of the vaccine to the health of schoolchildren will be medically addressed.

Under the bill, a total 1945,828,000 will be allocated for the medical assistance program for “Dengvaxiavaccines,” whether they are confined or not.

A total 1148,296,000 will be spent for the public health management assessment and monitoring of persons who received Dengvaxia shots. This will include the acquisition of supplies and medicines of not more than 125 million.

The remaining 167,586,000 will fund the human resources required for health deployment.

The bill also provides that the DOH will manage the funds and will issue the corresponding guidelines for the proper implementation of the measure.

Vargas, vice chairman of the House Committee on Appropriations, said the whole Dengvaxia controversy has caused “not only panic and paranoia” but also mental and emotional trauma among those who received the shots.

Pimentel, author of House Joint Resolution No. 21, noted that the current DOH budget is inadequate to fully cover the hospitalization and medical assistance to the schoolchildren.

Meanwhile, Rep. Sherwin Tugna (Cibacpartylist) said it is but right that the refund from the unused Dengvaxia vials be used to assist Dengvaxia recipients who were most affected by the effects of the vaccine.

“Almost 82 percent of the total amount shall fund the medical assistance for admitted patients. The remaining 18 percent is divided into monitoring of the vaccinees, purchase of supplies and medicines, and human resource deployment,” he noted.

It was recalled that in April, 2016, the Aquino administration launched a massive anti-dengue inoculation program using the Dengvaxia vaccine.

The program was suspended by the Duterte administration after Sanofi itself admitted in November, 2017, that Dengvaxia could increase the risk of contracting severe dengue for those who were vaccinated without prior infection.

The approved version of the supplemental budget now seeks to allocate a bigger amount for medical assistance while reducing the amount for the distribution of medical kits.