‘Supplemental budget for Dengvaxia victims approved next month’

Senate committee on finance chair Loren Legarda gave assurance yesterday that the P1.16-billion supplemental budget for health assistance to individuals inoculated with Dengvaxia will be approved when Congress resumes session in July.

Legarda, who was prepared to sponsor Committee Report No. 395 on the supplemental budget during the last session day of Congress last Wednesday, failed to convince her colleagues to accommodate the measure.

The Senate spent over 10 hours last Wednesday taking up the Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL), which was approved on third and final reading.

By the time the P1.16-billion supplemental budget was presented for sponsorship by Legarda, it was already past two in the morning and there were no longer enough senators to constitute a quorum.

“I was ready to sponsor the committee report and had repeatedly asked my colleagues to allow me to take up the measure, particularly during the short breaks while we were taking up the Bangsamoro Basic Law, but I was told that BBL must be finished first. I respected that and waited,” Legarda said.

In her remarks at the plenary, Legarda said “the committee on finance is ready” for the deliberation of the proposed measure.

“We conducted a hearing. We received the appropriations measure from the lower house. There was a certification that it’s urgent from Malacañang. The Bureau of Treasury has certified the funds are available. I leave it to the body to decide – do we want to allocate it now or to make them wait for another two months for the medical assistance to be given?” Legarda said.

Just like Legarda, Sen. Joseph Victor Ejercito aired his disappointment over the failure by the Senate to approve or at least take up the supplemental budget, which he said could ease the suffering being endured by the families of the individuals administered the anti-dengue vaccine.

Ejercito, Legarda and Sen. Richard Gordon filed separate bills on the supplemental budget.

“I guarantee that we will take this up as the first agenda when we resume our session after the State of the Nation Address in July. Congress stands adjourned sine die until July 23, but I assure the public, all the victims and their families, that this bill will be immediately approved to provide muchneeded aid to the affected families and ensure that the medical assistance program is not yet too late in terms of making sure that we keep our children safe and healthy,” Legarda said.

The P1.16 billion represents the money refunded by French drug manufacturer Sanofi Pasteur to the Department of Health (DOH) for the unused vaccines it purchased during the previous administration.