A total of 1.5 million government-procured doses of Sinovac arrived in the Philippines Saturday morning (July 17) at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) Terminal 3 via Cebu Pacific Flight 5J671.
According to GMA News reporter Mai Bermudez, Dr Ariel Valencia was at the airport to oversee the arrival of the vaccines.
Valencia is the director of the Procurement and Supply Chain Management Team of the Department of Health (DOH).
Valencia said the vaccines will be properly distributed to local government units after a certificate of analysis is issued for the shipment.
Another one million doses of Sinovac also arrived last Monday morning (July 12), which brought the supply of said vaccine up to 12 million doses.
Complementing these is another batch of COVID-19 vaccines, Janssen, developed by US-based Johnson & Johnson, that arrived Saturday afternoon at NAIA Terminal 3.
The shipment carrying over 1.6 million doses of Janssen vaccines comprise the first tranche of the 3.2 million doses donated by the United States through the COVAX Facility.
Department of Health Secretary Francisco Duque III said on Monday the newly-procured shots will be delivered to areas experiencing surges in COVID-19 cases such as Western and Eastern Visayas, Zamboanga Peninsula, Davao Region, Soccsksargen, and Caraga. With reports from Rod Lagusad/PG-rir
