Malacañang on Friday announced an updated priority list for the country’s Covid-19 vaccination program scheduled to begin this February.
The list was created by the Interim National Immunization Technical Advisory Group (iNITAG) and was approved by the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) on Emerging Infectious Diseases on Thursday, Palace spokesman Harry Roque said in a statement.
The following are the priority population groups for vaccination:
- A1: Frontline workers in health facilities both national and local, private and public, health professionals and non-professionals like students, nursing aides, janitors, barangay health workers, etc.
- A2: Senior citizens aged 60 years old and above
- A3: Persons with comorbidities not otherwise included in the preceding categories
- A4: Frontline personnel in essential sectors including uniformed personnel and those in working sectors identified by the IATF as essential during ECQ
- A5: Indigent population not otherwise included in the preceding categories
- B1: Teachers, Social Workers
- B2: Other Government Workers
- B3: Other essential workers
- B4: Socio-demographic groups at significantly higher risk other than senior citizens and indigenous people
- B5: Overseas Filipino Workers
- B6: Other Remaining Workforce
- C: Rest of the Filipino population not otherwise included in the above groups
Roque said the iNITAG had advised that any specific inclusion and exclusion criteria of each vaccine, as reflected in the respective emergency use authorization of the Food and Drug Administration or recommendations from the Health Technology Assessment Council should be considered.
Areas for sub-prioritization would be selected based on Covid-19 burden of disease (current active cases, attack rate per 100,000 population in the past 4 weeks and population density) and vaccination site and/or local government unit readiness, particularly, its supply chain capability, Roque added.
The country has P73.2 billion allocated for Covid-19 vaccines. John Ezekiel J. Hirro