Visayas, Mindanao to get Sinovac vaccines on March 3 and 5 – Galvez

After the initial vaccine rollout in Metro Manila on Monday, March 1, the China-made donated coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccines from Sinovac Biotech Ltd. will be transported to Visayas and Mindanao on March 3 and 5.

Secretary Carlito Galvez Jr., vaccine czar and chief implementer of the National Task Force (NTF) Against COVID-19, said Sinovac doses will be delivered to the Vicente Sotto Memorial Medical Center in Cebu City for the rollout in Visayas, and to the Southern Philippines Medical Center in Davao City for Mindanao.

"We will transport the vaccines this coming March 3 to 4 in Cebu, and March 5 to 6 in Davao. We will advance the transportation so they can start the rollout the following day," he said during the vaccine rollout at the Philippine General Hospital (PGH) in Manila.

It was not immediately clear how many doses of Sinovac vaccines will be allotted to Visayas and Mindanao.

Galvez said he was instructed by President Duterte to have an equal distribution of the 600,000 vaccine donations from China that arrived Sunday, Feb. 28. Medical frontliners are expected to get the first dose of the Chinese vaccines in the said hospitals.

"The President told me that we should not concentrate the distribution of the vaccines in one area only. We need to bring it to everyone. Nobody gets left behind," Galvez noted.

"He told me to bring the vaccines in Visayas and Mindanao, and in all areas where there is a notable increase of active cases right now," he added.

Galvez acknowledged that the country is now experiencing a surge in the number of active COVID-19 cases.

The Department of Health (DOH) recorded 29,763 active cases, or those who have yet to recover as of Sunday. The total number of COVID-19 cases has already reached 576,352.