Odette spoils vaccines

MANILA, Philippines — The onslaught of Super Typhoon Odette has rendered useless or potentially dangerous a still undetermined number of vaccine doses, the National Vaccination Operations Center (NVOC) reported yesterday.

At a briefing, NVOC’s Dr. Kezia Lorraine Rosario said some of the vaccines had to be discarded due to safety concerns.

“We are recording more wastage… We had to discard several because we’re not sure if they’re still safe to administer or not,” Rosario said. She said they are still consolidating figures on vaccine wastage.

According to Rosario, vaccines are considered wasted if they get submerged in floodwaters, are improperly stored for more than four hours, or if their labels get peeled off.

“Vaccine safety is a priority. If they can’t be saved it’s ok. We do not want to compromise safety, we can’t give vaccines to people if we can’t ensure they’re safe,” she said.

Officials earlier reported the wastage of 100 Pfizer vials in Iloilo. She said they were receiving reports on vaccine wastage from several regions.