Mayors commit to 120,000 virus inoculations daily
MANILA: Mayors of Metro Manila have commited to inoculate 120,000 people daily to ensure that the five million doses of Astrazeneca vaccines are used before their expiration dates in June and July, Health Secretary Francisco Duque reported on Wednesday.
According to Duque, Benhur Abalos, the chairman of the Metro Manila Development Authority ( MMDA) assured him the mayors agreed to achieve the target over the use of the Astrazeneca vaccines that represent the Philippines share from the COVAX facility set up by the World Health organisation ( WHO) in the war on the pandemic.
“Chairman Abalos has already commited. We are going to put the lion’s share of the Astrazeneca here in the NCR, the epicenter of the pandemic. They said they can. They have commited to inoculate 120,000 people per day,” Duque told ABS-CBN News Channel in an interview.
NCR stands for National Capital Region, the official name of Metro Manila composed of 16 cities and one town with a total population of about 13 million. As of Wednesday, Metro Manila has active cases of the virus, totaling 17,586.
“We are mindful,” Duque added, “of the expiration dates of the Astrazeneca vaccines. This is gold. We cannot afford to be dilly-dallying in terms of implementing our vaccine rollout plan.
“So, we are aggressively pursuing this.”
Earlier, Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire reported that of the two million Astrazeneca vaccines that already arrived in the country, 1.5 million doses are due to expire in June and the remaining 500,000 doses in July.
Metro Manila and four neighboring provinces - Rizal, Cavite and Laguna in Southern Luzon as well as Bulacan in Central Luzon - have been placed under the modified enhanced communituy quarantine (MECQ) lockdown until May 14.
But Harry Roque, the presidential spokesman, reported that members of the Inter-agency Task Force (IATF) for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases are to meet on Friday on whether they would recommend to President Duterte a new quarantine classification for Metro Manila and the four provinces.
Roque said the IATF members agreed to meet on Friday to decide on their recommendation because Thursday has been declared a regular holiday in observance of Eid, which marks the end of the Muslim Holy Month of Ramadan.
The issue of “total health” will be considered in recommending a possible easing of restrictions or the retaining the stricter restrictions under the MECQ, Roque said, noting that significant progress has been achieved in reducing the surge of virus infections that threatened to overwhelm Metro Manila’s healthcare system.