The Philippines on Monday received two million shots of the Chinese Sinovac Covid-19 vaccine, which brought the country’s total vaccine stock to 56,794,130 doses.
Vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. said the doses were procured by the national government.
The Philippines has received 33 million Sinovac doses in total, of which 31,100,000 doses were purchased by the national government.
Galvez said the doses would be deployed to “surge areas,” or areas with high Covid-19 risk.
Government officials recently said that the country would shift its vaccination priority from Metro Manila to other Philippine regions with low vaccination numbers.
“Priority natin ang mga different regions like Region 4-A, Region 3, Region 6, Region 11, Region 9 at saka ‘yung tinatawag nating mga surge areas at ‘yung lahat ng 151 highly-urbanized cities. Priority po natin yun,” Galvez said.
The Philippines has tallied 2,248,071 Covid-19 vaccine doses as of Sept. 13. John Ezekiel J. Hirro