The Quezon City government will file charges against two individuals who reportedly received three shots of different COVID-19 brands, Mayor Joy Belmonte said.
In a social media post, a netizen shared that he was vaccinated thrice, with two doses of Sinovac administered in Mandaluyong City and one shot of Moderna vaccine.
A similar incident was posted by another netizen for receiving a shot of Pfizer after having been fully vaccinated with Sinovac.
Quezon City Mayor Joy Belmonte said their local government has an ordinance against vaccine fraud.
“‘Yan ay talagang ikinalulungkot ko. For me, trahedya ‘yan. Ang bawat bakuna para sa amin parang ginto ‘yan,” she said.
Belmonte said they are pushing for a centralized database of the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) on vaccination to prevent such incidents from happening.
She added that they are planning to reorganize their pre-vaccination questionnaires to update the vaccination status query on whether an individual has been vaccinated in the past two weeks.
“Kasi tuloy, kapag sinagot mong ‘no,’ hindi ka nagsisinungaling kung matagal ka nang nagpabakuna. Pero kung iyong ‘[you] have been vaccinated’ at nag ‘no’ ka, fraud iyon, falsification of documents,” she said.
The Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) has yet to issue guidelines regarding the matter, saying that “one vaccine to you is a loss to another fellow.”
Although there are no legal sanctions imposed yet, the Department of Health (DOH) said the incident is considered a moral and ethical issue.
“Kung ano ang ibinakuna sa inyo, mayroong mga taong hindi nabakunahan dahil sa inyo. So lagi niyo po iisipin ‘yun na ang pakikipagkapwa-tao, lalo na ngayon sa panahon ng pandemya, ay napaka-importante,” DOH USec. Maria Rosario Vergeire said.
The DOH does not consider the third dose as a booster shot, as there are still no recommendations on this type of inoculation. The recipients will remain under monitoring for possible adverse events.
Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) chairperson Benhur Abalos appealed to the public to avoid getting more than the required vaccine dose, noting that there are still challenges on the supply. – Report from Allan Francisco/AG-rir
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