Philippines welcomes over 1.3M Moderna COVID-19 vaccine doses
The Philippines on Tuesday welcomed a total of 1,353,800 doses of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine which were procured by the government.
According to the National Task Force Against COVID-19, the vaccines landed at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport Terminal 1 around 9:40 a.m. via flight CI701.
The vaccines were welcomed by vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr.
“This would be allocated for our children vaccination… second, it will be used also for boosters. We are very thankful, I would like to thank the Philippine FDA… for releasing the EUA amendment for the vaccines, including Pfizer, Sinovac, AstraZeneca, and also Sputnik,” Galvez said.
In its advisory, the Department of Health recommended using Moderna, Pfizer, and Sinovac as booster doses.
“These vaccines, like Moderna, will be for our three-day national vaccination holiday. We will wrap up most of the vaccines for the first and second dosing,” he added.
The government will hold a three-day national vaccination campaign against COVID-19 from November 29 to December 1.
The NTF said the Philippines has fully vaccinated over 31 million as of November 11.
Galvez said the country has welcomed around 124 million doses and is expecting another 16 million, bringing the total to 140 million by the end of November.
“‘Yun na yung ating naka-allocate for this year. And then ‘yung December na darating, it will be allocated for the first quarter boostering and also yung ating remaining first doses and second doses,” he said.
(This is allocated for this year. And then vaccines that will arrive in December will be allocated for the first quarter boostering and also the remaining vaccination of first and second doses.)
On Monday, the Philippines logged 1,547 new COVID-19 infections, bringing the nationwide tally to 2,818,511 and active cases to 27,025.
Meanwhile, face shields are now optional in areas under Alert Levels 3, 2, or 1. — RSJ, GMA News