DOH planning to conduct special week of vaccinations

MANILA, Philippines — The Department of Health (DOH) has bared its plan to conduct a special week of vaccination drive by the end of the month in line with the efforts to ramp up the country’s immunity against COVID-19.

DOH officer-in-charge Maria Rosario Vergeire admitted that the PinasLakas vaccination program, at this time, is “way below” its target of giving anti-COVID booster shots for at least 23 million Filipinos by the 100th day of the Marcos administration on Oct. 8.

Although the details of the special week are still being ironed out, she said this would step up the initial gains of the government’s PinasLakas.

“This is just one of the strategies we will be adopting so we can expand vaccination efforts in the country’s different regions,” Vergeire said at a recent press briefing. “We might not be able to reach the original target but at least we now aim to achieve half of it so that we can raise the wall of immunity in the country.”

Vergeire said they already had a meeting with the different Centers for Health Development and the DOH’s regional offices, together with the regional vaccine operations centers, where “further strategies aimed at increasing the number of those getting vaccinated or boosted” were presented.

The DOH, she added, also coordinated with different medical societies in the country to help “push further what were already achieved under the program.”

For the Private Hospitals Association of the Philippines Inc. (PHAPI), the DOH might be able to increase the numbers of recipients in the vaccination drive if it conducts a “house-to-house” campaign.

“What we are suggesting is if there are not that many showing up in the government’s targeted vaccination sites, maybe health care workers can go directly to the people and have the latter vaccinated inside their homes,” said Dr. Jose de Grano, PHAPI president.

“I think we should start it already. The people have been waiting for them but maybe because others only suffer from mild symptoms (of COVID-19), they don’t worry much,” De Grano added in a text message.
On Wednesday, the DOH recorded 1,558 new COVID-19 infections – the lowest daily tally since July 12 when 1,363 cases were recorded.

Launched last July 26, Vergeire said the PinasLakas campaign aims to “reach 90 percent of our senior citizens for their primary series, and second, at least 50 percent for the eligible population for the first booster doses.”

DOH data showed a cumulative accomplishment of 24,661 for senior citizens, which is far from the target of at least 17,000 per day. The figure represents only 2.03 percent of the target population for primary series for seniors.

At the same time, Vergeire said the cumulative total is over 2.1 million for the first booster shots or 8.82 percent of the target eligible population of 23 million.

The DOH data also showed that, as of Aug. 30, about 72.5 million Filipinos have been fully vaccinated. Of that number, 6.8 million are senior citizens, 9.9 million are adolescents and 4.7 million are children.