DOH chief likely to get CA nod — lawmaker
After successively rejecting two leftist members of President Duterte’s Cabinet, the Commission on Appointments will most likely confirm Health Secretary Paulyn Jean Ubial.
Ubial is the only remaining unconfirmed original Cabinet appointee of the President.
“We have no major issues against her. Most of us are supporting her confirmation,” Isabela Rep. Rodolfo Albano lll said yesterday.
He said there’s one pending opposition against Ubial, filed by Rep. Harry Roque of party-list group Kabayan, who is accusing Ubial of being ambivalent on the use of a newly developed dengue vaccine.
But Ubial, in a report to the House committee on health chaired by Quezon Rep. Helen Tan, said she had consistently raised questions on the vaccination program when she was still undersecretary of the Department of Health (DOH).
She said she questioned the program targeting “one million subjects” or students in public elementary schools, when in the past, new vaccines were used on “20,000 to 40,000 subjects only.” The DOH did not have sufficient preparation for the inoculation project.
“Why introduce a new vaccine in such large scale and short preparatory period? Herd immunity, long-term immunity and long-term adverse events are not yet established. Other vaccines confer lifelong immunity and have the benefit of herd immunity,” Ubial said.
“Without proper priming of the health community and the general public, even one death in vaccinated subjects (even if it is not related to the vaccination) would raise questions on the integrity of the immunization program and DOH as a whole,” she added.
Three young students had died six months after receiving their first dose of the new dengue vaccine, though it had not been established that their deaths were related to their vaccination.
Ubial had also questioned why the DOH spent P3.5 billion on a single vaccine.
“The amount is too much. The same amount is the budget allotted for vaccines for 12 preventable diseases,” she said.
She said the vaccine was procured in record time of less than three months, with the funds released on Dec. 29, 2015 and the supplier making its first delivery on March 16, 2016, two months before the presidential elections that year.
She also said the P3.5 billion was not in the 2015 or 2016 DOH budget.
The vaccines were procured during the time of former Iloilo representative Janette Garin as health secretary.
Another congressman, John Bertiz of Acts-OFW, filed an opposition against Ubial’s confirmation but did not pursue it after the DOH chief cancelled the accreditation of eight clinics accused of monopolizing health certification for Kuwait-bound workers.
Earlier, the CA turned down the appointments of Judy Taguiwalo as social welfare secretary, Gina Lopez as environment secretary and Perfecto Yasay Jr. as foreign affairs secretary.
This week, the CA rejected the appointment of agrarian reform secretary Rafael Mariano.
Palace designates OIC for DAR
Malacañang yesterday issued a memorandum designating Undersecretary Rosalina Bistoyong as officer-in-charge of the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR).
Bistoyong, a career executive service professional, has been in government service for the past 28 years, serving as DAR undersecretary since 2010.
Upon the instruction of the President, Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea designated Bistoyong to “ensure the effective delivery of public service.” Bistoyong has hands-on experience in supporting the agrarian reform beneficiaries and indigenous peoples.
As undersecretary for the support services office of DAR, she has led projects and provided policy directions in the implementation of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program.
One of her advocacies is addressing the pressing problems brought by climate change in rural communities. She took steps in strengthening, diversifying and enhancing agrarian reform projects in climate stricken areas.
“We in the department continue to climate-proof our agrarian reform communities to help mitigate the bad effects of climate change. Also to help our farmers adapt to it by identifying the problems they face and create options so that steps can be taken to solve them,” Bistoyong said.