By Christine Fabro
The citizens’ vaccine hesitancy is giving some senators second thoughts on whether the government will achieve its target of herd immunity in the country.
In a tweeted statement, Sen. Win Gatchalian said that vaccine hesitancy is evident in Valenzuela where only 20% of citizens have registered for vaccination and only 19% of senior citizens came for vaccination.
Concurring, Sen. Sonny Angara said that the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) should now administer jabs to those who are in the A4 priority list before the vaccines expire.
Meanwhile, Sen. Koko Pimentel opined that people cannot be forced to get vaccinated most especially now that the vaccination program is still in its trial stage.
“The vaccines are in a trial stage, hence, we are therefore practically forcing Filipinos to participate in the trial phase of the vaccines and vaccination requires the introduction into a healthy human body of chemicals, [in which] I don’t think we can force that,” he said.
“There will always be people who are “not qualified” to get the vaccine because of health or religious reasons, hence, a literal 100% compliance to vaccination can never be achieved,” Pimentel said.
Senate President Vicente Sotto III has announced on Monday (May 17) that at least 73% of the senate employees were already vaccinated against COVID-19.
During President Rodrigo Duterte’s Talk to the People on May 18, he said that people who do not want to get vaccinated just “lengthen the herd immunity.”
“Maniwala kayo sa gobyerno. Kasi kung di kayo makatulong, you will just lengthen the herd immunity… Walang basehan ang problema niyo sa takot. Walang namatay sa bakuna, kung meron na, may sakit na talaga,” he said. –rir
