Philippines gets more procured Pfizer doses

A nurse holds a vial of a Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine at Hospital Posta Central in Santiago, on January 15, 2021.
AFP / Claudio Reyes

MANILA, Philippines — The Philippines on Wednesday night received 1,015,560 more doses of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine that added to its procured supply.

State-run Philippine News Agency reported that a plane carrying 862,290 doses arrived at the NAIA Terminal 3 in Pasay on the evening of October 7.

Some 76,050 doses, meanwhile, were delivered to Cebu and the remaining 77,220 would be sent to Davao today. 

Both provinces, apart from Metro Manila, are the only areas in the country with storage capacity for Pfizer’s jabs.

This latest shipment brought the country’s supply of the said vaccine to 15.84 million doses, according to Philstar.com’s monitoring.

Of that, 8.83 million doses were donations coursed through the global initiative COVAX Facility, while 7.01 million were purchased by government. 

Assistant Secretary Wilben Mayor of the National Task Force against COVID-19 said the allocation of the new doses would focus on the provinces.

The arrival comes as the country sets its vaccination for minors on October 15. Pfizer and Moderna are the only brands cleared for emergency use by local drug regulators to date.

Latest data showed there are now 22.40 million Filipinos complete with their COVID-19 vaccine. 

That figure is out of the 70 million the government is targeting this year to reach "population protection." 

Some 25.37 million have received an initial shot, with 47.77 million doses in total administered. 

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