DOH: Budget available to address possible effects of ‘FLiRT’ variants

The Department of Health (DOH) on Wednesday said it is open to making modifications in its existing budget to address and mitigate the possible effects to the country of the new COVID-19 variants dubbed as “FLiRT.”

EXPLAINER: Is PH at risk of 'FLiRT' COVID-19 variants?

DOH Undersecretary Achilles Gerard Bravo said this during the oversight meeting of the House committee on appropriations with DOH, after panel senior vice chairperson Stella Quimbo sought clarification about reports of a supposed non-existent budget of DOH to deal with another impending COVID-19 situation. 

“Nakakagulat dahil sa dami ng pera natin…klaro naman na maraming pwedeng pagkunan ng pondo, tama po? Halimbawa, may quick response fund… and at the same time, may communicable disease program na obviously, halos hindi nagagamit pa,” Quimbo said. 

(This is surprising because we have a lot of money and we can source the funding for that elsewhere. For example, there is a quick response fund, and there is also a communicable disease program that you are hardly even using.) 

“Kahit na sabihin natin na walang line item para sa specific variant na ‘yun dahil hindi pa natin alam na may ganung variant nung panahon na sinusulat natin ang 2024 GAA (General Appropriations Act), pwede naman ‘yun,” she added. 

(We can make solutions for that even if we say that there was no line item for that specific variant because we did not know there was such at the time we were writing the 2024 GAA.)

Bravo, a former assistant secretary at the Department of Budget and Management, affirmed that DOH can allocate appropriations to prepare for the effects of the FLiRT variants. 

“You are correct that we have so many funds at DOH, even from the conap (continuing appropriation) in 2023 and the current. If there’s a need to provide something for the emerging COVID variant, we can always make some modifications within our budget,” he said. 

DOH spokesperson Assistant Secretary Albert Domingo echoed this, saying that the agency has an available budget should there be a health emergency caused by the new COVID-19 strains. 

In December 2023, it could be recalled that Health Secretary Ted Herbosa said that the DOH did not allocate any budget for the procurement of new COVID-19 vaccines for 2024.

Herbosa made the announcement as the country's supply of COVID-19 monovalent and bivalent vaccines back then were already exhausted, following the lifting of the State of Public Health Emergency in July last year. 

Domingo previously explained that budget allocations for COVID-19 vaccination are only made based on an assessment of public health needs. But since the FLiRT variants only pose low or mild case severity, he said “there may not be an urgent need to budget and procure as before.” 

The KP.2 and KP.3, more commonly known as “FLiRT,” are currently circulating COVID-19 variants under monitoring by the World Health Organization. They are descendants of the JN.1—a variant of interest—which was responsible for the infection increase earlier this year. 

Herbosa recently directed the Bureau of Quarantine (BOQ) to conduct thorough screening at points of entry for arriving visitors coming from countries where the new FLiRT variants have been detected. —AOL, GMA Integrated News