MANILA, Philippines — The Philippines has received 362,700 more doses of Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine as part of its procured supply.
The Air Hongkong flight LD456 landed at the NAIA Terminal 3 in Pasay on Wednesday night.
Some 262,080 doses of the shipment will go to Metro Manila, while Cebu got its 50,310 also yesterday. This Thursday, the government said Davao would also get 50,310 doses.
The three locations are the only areas in the country so far with capacity for storing the jabs.
"Based on discussions with the vaccine cluster, these will be deployed in [areas with] high cases," said Assistant Secretary Wilben Mayor of the pandemic task force in Filipino. "Our principle is focus and expand."
This delivery brought the country's total supply of Pfizer vaccine to 4.95 million to date, according to Philstar.com's research.
Broken down, 2.479 million were purchased by government while 2.472 million were donations coursed through the COVAX Facility.
Official figures as of August 23 showed there are now 13.19 million Filipinos fully vaccinated for COVID-19. That is against the target of inoculating up to 70 million this year.
Some 17.49 million, meanwhile, have received their first dose. The country has administered 30.69 million doses in total. — with reports from Philstar.com intern Siegfred Aldous Lacerna