The Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) on Emerging Infectious Diseases has approved the list of sectors included in the A4 priority group of the government’s Covid-19 vaccination program.

Sectors under A4 will be inoculated after health workers (A1), senior citizens (A2) and persons with co-morbidities (A3).

According to Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire,  sectors under A4 were classified essential “because their work cannot stop.”

Below is the list of groups under A4:

  • Commuter transport (land, air and sea), including logistics
  • Public and private wet and dry market vendors
  • Frontline workers in groceries, supermarkets, delivery services
  • Workers in manufacturing for food, beverage, medical and pharmaceutical products
  • Frontline workers in food retail, including food service delivery
  • Frontline workers in private and government financial services
  • Frontline workers in hotels and accommodation establishments
  • Priests, rabbis, imams, and other religious leaders
  • Security guards/ personnel assigned in offices, agencies, and organizations identified in the list of priority industries/sectors
  • Frontline workers in private and government news media
  • Customer-facing personnel of telecoms, cable and internet service providers, electricity distribution and water distribution utilities
  • Frontline personnel in basic education and higher education institutions and agencies
  • Overseas Filipino workers, including those scheduled for deployment within two months
  • Frontline workers in law/justice, security, and social protection sectors
  • Frontline government workers engaged in the operations of government transport system, quarantine inspection
  • Worker safety inspection and other COVID-19 response activities
  • Frontline government workers in charge of tax collection, assessment of businesses for incentives, election, national ID, data collection personnel
  • Diplomatic community and Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) personnel in consular operations
  • Department of Public Works and Highways personnel in charge of monitoring government infrastructure projects

The country has so far received 3.025 million Covid-19 vaccine doses.

The government’s inoculation program has rolled out 1,255,716 doses of Covid-19 vaccines as of April 15.

So far, the country has been using only vaccines from China’s Sinovac and British firm AstraZeneca. John Ezekiel J. Hirro