(Eagle News) — Philippine vaccine czar Calito Galvez Jr., said that the first delivery of COVID-19 vaccines in the country will be by February 20, and that the vaccines will be administered by the “third or fourth week of February”.
In a senate hearing probing the National plan on COVID-19 vaccines on Monday, January 11, 2021, Galvez said that there are still negotiations on their final stages but that they cannot disclose details about these.
But he said that the first batch of vaccines will be delivered to the country on February 20.
Galvez, however, did not disclose what these vaccines were, or how many were these doses.
The vaccine czar said that the first immunizations will happen by the third or fourth week of February.
“The supply and demand is very volatile po talaga,” he explained.
-Vaccination to start by end of February-
“It is safe to say that we will be having (vaccination) by the last week of February,” Galvez said.
The vaccine czar said that 80 percent of the volume of world’s vaccine supplies had already been cornered.
Galvez said that the Philippine government has already secured 30 million doses from NovaVax, an American vaccine development company headquartered in Gaithersburg, Maryland.
This is also expandable to 40 million doses, or an additional 10 million vaccine doses for local government units (LGUs), he said.
Galvez said that the delivery of the majority of the vaccine procurements will happen by the middle of the year, coming from various vaccine manufacturers or developers.
The Philippine goverment targets to get 148 million vacccine doses this year for the vaccination of 50 million to 70 million Filipinos.
(Eagle News Service)
