By Lade Jean Kabagani | Philippine News Agency
MANILA – The Philippines has so far administered 836,162 doses of COVID-19 vaccines during the fourth leg of the “Bayanihan, Bakunahan” National Vaccination Drive (NVD 4).
Health Undersecretary Myrna Cabotaje, who also heads the National Vaccination Operations Center, reported on Saturday (March 12) that the cumulative administered doses are just 44.49% of the targeted 1.8 million doses.
Of the total, 202,915 were used as first doses, 359,546 as second shots, and 273,701 were boosters.
The government is mulling to extend the three-day NVD 4 that will end Saturday.
Cabotaje lauded the efforts of local government units to make sure that senior citizens and other vulnerable populations can have convenient access to the vaccines but exhorted them to do more.
“We need more innovative and creative strategies in the level of communities because we can still see in the data there are still those who are needing second dose and booster dose, especially our senior citizens,” Cabotaje said partly, in Filipino, during the Laging Handa public briefing.
There is also complacency in getting booster doses “because they already have full primary doses, the cases are declining, and they think there’s no threat anymore,” added Cabotaje.
More than 64 million Filipinos are fully vaccinated, with 10.7 million of them already with booster doses.
As of March 11, the Philippines has already received 235,994,010 doses, including 1,080,000 doses of the reformulated Pfizer jabs that arrived Friday night. (PNA)
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