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[av_heading heading=’Probe on PH purchase of Dengvaxia mulled’ tag=’h3′ style=’blockquote modern-quote’ size=’30’ subheading_active=’subheading_below’ subheading_size=’15’ padding=’10’ color=” custom_font=” av-medium-font-size-title=” av-small-font-size-title=” av-mini-font-size-title=” av-medium-font-size=” av-small-font-size=” av-mini-font-size=” admin_preview_bg=”][/av_heading]
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Sunday, December 3, 2017
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MANILA – The Justice department was planning to investigate the government’s multibillion-peso purchase of the dengue vaccine Dengvaxia.
The Health department suspended its dengue immunization program after manufacturer Sanofi Pasteur warned that the vaccination may pose risks to those who have not been infected by the dengue virus.
“I will have it investigated and I will prepare ASAP the appropriate department order,” Justice secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II said in a statement.
The Department of Health (DOH) under then secretary Janette Garin of Iloilo bought P3.5 billion worth of Dengvaxia in March 2016.
“Everybody who has some involvement will be included and appropriate charges will be filed against them if warranted,” Aguirre added.
According to Sanofi Pasteur, Dengvaxia works as expected in people previously infected by the dengue virus.
But for those who were not, “the analysis found that, in the longer term, more cases of severe disease could occur following vaccination upon a subsequent dengue infection,” it said in an advisory.
“Severe disease” means a “severe” case of dengue and not of any other disease, Health secretary Francisco Duque III clarified.
Aguirre said he will also order the National Bureau of Investigation to determine whether “proper warning has been communicated by the manufacturer/supplier to DOH” that the vaccine “should not be given to somebody who has not been sick of dengue before.”
For its part, the Department of Education (DepEd) will help monitor schoolchildren who were administered with Dengvaxia.
“The health and safety of our learners are of principal importance,” the DepEd said in a statement.
“As a stakeholder, DepEd will likewise be actively participating in the review and consultations of DOH on the dengue vaccination program,” it added.
Around 733,000 public schoolchildren 9 years old and above in three highly endemic regions – Metro Manila, Central Luzon and Calabarzon – have received at least the first of three doses of the first licensed dengue vaccine, said the DOH.
Around 10 percent of the schoolchildren who had been vaccinated with Dengvaxia have not had dengue prior to immunization, Duque said.
Dengue hemorrhagic fever is an acute viral infection transmitted via the bite of Aedes aegypti mosquitoes. (GMA News Online and Adrian Stewart Co/PN)
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