MANILA: The Philippines on Monday launched an ambitious three-day vaccination drive to give Covid-19 shots to up to 9 million Filipinos amid the threat of the highly mutated Omicron variant of the coronavirus.
Tens of thousands of members of the security forces and volunteers were deployed nationwide to implement the campaign, which was being held as the country again imposed international travel restrictions.
“The national vaccination day is very timely and truly a milestone in our Covid-19 pandemic response and mitigation efforts,” said Carlito Galvez, the country’s vaccination chief. “Inoculating 9 million individuals in three days … is our most ambitious target so far.”
That would mean vaccinating 3 million people a day, or nearly four times the average of 813,734 daily doses in the past week, according to the Department of Health.
Before Monday, more than 35.78 million Filipinos had been fully vaccinated, or over 32 per cent of the country’s total population of 110 million, the department said. The government aims to vaccinate 54 million people by the end of 2021 and 77 million by next March.
Galvez said that with country’s increasing supply of vaccines, the key was now to “accelerate and expand the capacity” of local government units, especially those outside the capital region of Metro Manila, to reach all those eligible for shots.
At the weekend, the Philippines banned flights from 14 countries,including seven European nations, due to rising numbers of Covid-19cases and the detection of the Omicron variant.
The government also indefinitely delayed a previous decision to start accepting some foreign tourists again from December 1.
The Philippines’ daily tally of Covid-19 cases has been going down since last month, prompting the government to ease restrictions before Omicron was designated a variant of concern.
On Monday, the Department of Health reported a daily tally of 665 cases, a 17-month low, bringing the country’s total caseload to more than 2.83 million. The death toll was up 141 to 48,501.
Despite the decline in the number of cases, President Rodrigo Duterte urged the public to continue cooperating with efforts to prevent the spread of the virus.
“I call on every Filipino for your continued cooperation in fighting against Covid-19 by getting vaccinated and continuing to follow our minimum public health standards,” he said at the launch of the vaccination drive. “It is very important for us to take a whole-of-nation approach to win against coronavirus that has sorely plagued our country for almost two years,” he added. – dpa
