House panel to resume Dengvaxia probe

THE House committee on good government and public accountability will resume its inquiry on the Dengvaxia mess on November 20 and 21, Rep. Xavier Jesus Romualdo said Sunday.

Romualdo, the head of the panel, said they will “tie up loose ends” and get “a more complete picture” on how the government procured the P3.5 billion worth of dengue vaccine.

“I thought that in order to come up with a very complete and comprehensive report, we need to reopen and ask a few questions to some resource persons to tie up the story, and really see what happened,” Romualdo said in an interview.

The committee, which was formerly headed by Surigao del Sur Rep. Johnny Pimentel, already held several joint hearings with the House committee on health headed by Quezon Rep. Angelina Tan.

Romualdo said the panel will likely invite former president Benigno Aquino 3rd, former Health secretary Janette Garin, and former Budget secretary Florencio “Butch” Abad.

“We will invite all former or incumbent officials, from those in the bottom to those in the top of the government hierarchy, who played a role in the registration and procurement of Dengvaxia and the planning and implementation of the vaccination program…but we don’t intend to invite them all together,” he said.

The government suspended the antidengue vaccination program in 2017 after French pharmaceutical company Sanofi Pasteur admitted that children who never had dengue but received the vaccine have higher risks of contracting severe cases of the disease.

The Department of Health had said 900,000 children were inoculated with the vaccine.