The Bangsamoro government has set aside P500 million of its recently passed 2021 budget for the procurement of COVID-19 vaccine doses.

This year’s P75.6-billion budget of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARRM) prioritizes education, public works, and health.

BARMM Chief Minister Murad Ebrahim earlier said that their 2021 budget “hopes to reassess and refurnish, if needed, existing response to the ongoing crisis and provide the opportunity to bounce back better as a region.”

The funds for the vaccine procurement is on top of the P380 million appropriated funds of the Ministry of Health (MOH) for the implementation of its COVID-19 response plan.

Dr Amirel Usman, BARMM Minister of Health, told Rappler that the budget is the region’s “initial budget for now, but we will increase if the need arises.”

Usman clarified that the vaccine procurement will be coordinated with the National Task Force to enter into a tripartite agreement.  – Rappler.com