ILOILO – The Sangguniang Panlalawigan (SP) will ask for surplus vaccines against coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) from Canada, United States, Australia, Israel, United Kingdom, and member-states of the European Union, among others.
“Daw suntok sa buwan man lang ini pero basi pa man lang bala matigayon,” said Vice Gov. Christine Garin.
The 270,000 AstraZeneca COVID-19 jabs that the provincial government ordered are yet to arrive while vaccine allocations from the national government “medyo kulang and hinay ang pag-abot,” she pointed out.
“We need these (vaccines) urgently,” Garin stressed.
Earlier, the SP passed a resolution, authored by 4th District Provincial Board member Rolando Distura appealing for vaccines from the Canadian government following reports by Ilonggos there that there’s an overabundance of vaccines in Canada.
The SP would request Canadian Prime Minister Justine Trudeau through the Ambassador to the Philippines Peter James MacArthur for vaccine donations.
“Para sa akon wala sang may madula sa aton kon magpasar sang sini nga resolution,” Distura said. “Kay may mga pungsod particularly Canada nga nagasorobra didto ang ila vaccines…”
However, during their regular session, the 13th SP agreed to also appeal for vaccines from other countries.
According to Distura, should the countries positively respond to the SP’s request, this would be a “great help to the Ilonggos.”
Meanwhile, based on the data (as of July 9) from the Provincial Health Office, 97,361 residents of the province have already received their first dose of the vaccines against coronavirus disease.
These include the health workers – 30,444, senior citizens – 36,400, persons with co-morbidities – 29,980 and uniformed personnel – 452, and others – 85.
There were 60,168 recipients of the CoronaVac (Sinovac) vaccines, AtraZeneca – 35,154 and Pfizer – 2,039./PN
