ILOILO City – This southern city has nearly 50,000 doses of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccines that already expired and nearing expiration.
These will be replaced by the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-MEID), according to Mayor Jerry Treñas.
Among the expired and expiring vaccines were Moderna and Pfizer.
“May ara arrangement sa IATF…islan nila para sige-sige diri aton nga bakuna,” he said.
As reported to the city mayor by the City Health Office (CHO) officer-in-charge Dr. Annabelle Tang, the city had 31,900 doses of Moderna COVID-19 vaccine with the expiry date of June 7; 3,936 doses of Pfizer that will expire on June 30; and 15,000 more doses of Pfizer that expired last month.
Why were vaccines not utilized and just expired?
Treñas noted that while the city has a 128 percent accomplishment rate in terms of giving primary COVID-19 vaccine doses, its booster accomplishment is still low at around 40 percent only.
“This is happening not only here, this is a universal thing,” the city mayor lamented.
Bringing the vaccines closer to the people in the barangays through district health centers is one of the strategies being pushed.
Treñas also said the city government will look into the possibility of incentivizing the COV Id-19 booster shot “because we really want to give more protection.”
The city mayor, however, is not keen on bringing back the mega vaccination sites especially that there are only at most 400 individuals availing themselves of COVID-19 vaccines daily in the various district health centers.
Treñas urged senior citizens, the immune=compromised and healthcare workers to already avail themselves of second booster shots also available in all district health centers.
He noted that he himself who is a senior citizen already received his second booster shot Thursday last week, June 2./PN
