Sinovac vaccines arrive in Northern Mindanao

Around 17,400 vials of the Sinovac COVID-19 vaccine have arrived in Northern Mindanao on Thursday, March 4.

The vaccines, encased in a bio-freezers, arrived at the Laguindingan Airport and were attended to by City Health Officer Dr Lorraine Nery, logistics cluster head of Cagayan de Oro’s inter-agency task force on COVID-19 Dr William Bernardo, and Misamis Oriental Provincial Health Officer Dr Jerie Calingasan.

Cagayan de Oro, the regional center, would receive around half of the vaccine doses, data from the Department of Health (DOH) in Region 10 show.

According to Dr Bernard Julius Rocha, spokesperson and liaison officer of the Northern Mindanao Medical Center (NMMC), 1,820 frontline workers from NMMC will get the jab on Friday, March 5.

The NMMC, the biggest government-owned hospital in the region, is the official COVID-19 referral hospital for Northern Mindanao. It is where the first of Northern Mindanao’s 10,776 COVID-19 cases since March 2020 was recorded.

“We are expecting to vaccinate 80% of our employees with the vaccine,” Rocha said.

The vaccines – 17,400 doses in 29 boxes – would be used on some 8,020 frontliners throughout Region 10, according to Dr Bernardo. At two doses each, that would be immunity for 16,040 people.

None of the vaccines would reach the villages, Bernardo stressed. He said Cagayan de Oro alone requires vaccine shots for about 13,000 frontliners.

“The frontliners get the priority. Only when we’re done with them can we start bringing the vaccines to the villages,” he said.

Some 300 doctors and other frontliners in the government’s campaign against COVID-19 at NMMC, however, have declined Sinovac vaccine shots that would be given starting Friday morning.

Those who refused to be administered with the vaccines from Beijing include physicians, officials confirmed.

“There are differences in opinion, and we respect theirs,” said Dr. William Bernardo, head for logistics of the local COVID-19 inter-agency task force.

A Herculean task

Cagayan de Oro Mayor Oscar Moreno said it would take time before the government could vaccinate people in the region’s barangays. He described the task ahead as “Herculean,” and added,  “We won’t achieve community immunity by Holy Week. By that time, we’d still be vaccinating the healthcare workers.”

Jeffrey Saclot, spokesperson of Misamis Oriental’s COVID-19 task force, said the capitol is very happy to see that the first doses of the Sinovac vaccines have arrived in the region, but that his province alone requires vaccines for at least 300,000 people.

Saclot said Misamis Oriental officials expect the national government to provide at least 70% of the province’s vaccine requirements. He said the capitol has set aside funds to shoulder 20% of the costs, and the independent power producer STEAG State Power Inc. committed to provide 10% of the vaccine doses needed in Misamis Oriental. 

Based on DOH data, Cagayan de Oro would get the bulk of the doses, enough to give vaccine shots to 4,663 frontliners in various hospitals.

Marawi City’s Amai Pakpak Medical Center, a hospital in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM), will receive doses good for 1,181 of its frontliners. Other hospitals helping the COVID-19 task force elsewhere in the region would receive doses for 77 up to 840 people each. – Rappler.com

Editor’s Note: A previous version of this story wrongly said Department of Health Region 10 Director Adriano Subaan was present at the Laguindingan Airport, and misspelled Dr Jerie Calingasan’s first name as “Jerry.” We have corrected this error.