BY MATÉ ESPINA
I AM NOT sure which is the more important news item in Bacolod today – the launch of the “Negros for Leni” campaign or that Bacolod is in the national news after getting the DOH’s nod for its COVID-19 vaccination program.
Both are my top stories but I’d like to start off with our city’s supposed preparedness for mass vaccination which targets over 400,000 of the 600,000 population and for which the city has already made a downpayment of P31 million for the purchase of AstraZeneca vaccines.
Bacolod’s Mayor Bing Leonardia said there will be three groups, Group A which will target 189,533 residents, including 12,462 medical frontliners, almost 67,000 senior citizens, 109,000 indigents and about a thousand uniformed personnel.
Group B will be additional frontline workers and special population and the rest of the identified population in Group C.
Of course, these will be implemented by the third quarter of this year and the long wait is what makes this story less exciting. That, plus the fact that as a taxpayer, I am actually part of the so-called remaining population and not a priority. Oh well.
It’s maddening that even conflict areas like Myanmar and even a far less progressive country like Ghana are way ahead of us in mass vaccination against this pandemic. Worse is you have a national government ramming down our throats the Sinopharm vaccines whose acceptability rate is much lower than other vaccines.
Still, it’s a welcoming note that our city government is doing everything it can to ensure that within the year, at least, we will see Bacolodnons getting inoculated with anti-COVID vaccines.
Of course, that’s assuming that from today till then, the city will be able to convince 90 percent of the population to go through vaccination since the latest survey showed that only 10 percent of the residents here are willing to be inoculated.
I have been advocating for mass vaccination and I even volunteered to take part in the J&J vaccines’ clinical trial here. But alas, my wish was ignored and I did not get a call to participate. Nor did I get a call from the local surveys.
But I am not surprised about the low acceptance because a friend of mine who works for a multi-national company admitted that they, too, had a hard time filling up their list of who wants to get the vaccine that their mother company has already ordered, way ahead of the national government. And yes, it’s not even a China-made vaccine.
It is not also helping makers of Sinovac that you have a Mon Tulfo advocating for their vaccines and bragging that he got inoculated along with top government officials, way back in October which makes it unlawful since there was no FDA approval for any vaccines yet and clearly those made it illegal smuggling. Ah, talk about circumventing the law when you are in power.
Just this week, I also attended a virtual conference where distributors of Covovax vaccine pitched their distribution plans and how efficacious this vaccine is, over other vaccines.
Covovax is owned by Novavax, Inc., a US biotechnology company. The vaccine is manufactured in the Serum Institute of India which plans to come up with at least 1.2 billion doses intended for India and other low and medium-income countries.
We all know that India has over a billion population but according to Faberco, Covovax’s distributor, the Philippine government, through Gen. Carlito Galvez, has already indicated to purchase 30 million doses.
Members of the sugar industry and other LGUs here participated in that virtual conference and the interest to purchase is high since Covovax is actually affordable and can easily be distributed without the need for special refrigeration unit.
Faberco said that while they are looking also at the third quarter for the rollout, if things will be processed faster, we may see Covovax in the market by June or July. It is really irritating that we have to wait for the national government’s approval to acquire a vaccine. And unless you are senior citizen or an indigent, you are last in their list.
Another hot topic is the recent launch of the Leni Robredo for President which activated trolls and rabid DSS in social media. They even condemned media entities that covered the launch as “bayaran.”
I followed one news outfit and the exchanges between DDS and pro-Leni supporters were very entertaining. However, it is quite obvious that when it comes to issues, you can easily identify where these DDS get their information from as they have similar retorts.
It is fun to follow the exchanges but at some point, one must admit, there is no use engaging another who does not see reason and blinded by skewed idolatry.
It is not surprising that former Negros Occidental governor Lito Coscolluela is at the helm of the pro-Leni group as he has always been very vocal against the present administration.
Gov. Lito remains highly respected in this community and with many support groups backing his signature campaign, they can easily get 100,000 residents to sign the petition urging Vice President Leni to run for the top post come 2022./PN
