The Philippines is expecting an arrival of 170 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine this year, according to the National Task Force against COVID-19.
The Philippine government is in talks with various vaccine manufacturers to procure vaccines needed to inoculate more than 70 million Filipinos to achieve herd immunity.
Vaccine Czar Carlito Galvez Jr. said the bulk of vaccines from various pharmaceutical companies will be arriving in August.
Galvez said the delivery of 25 million vaccines procured from Chinese drug maker Sinovac is on-going.
“It’s very important because we are racing against time and we want also to inoculate our people immediately because of the rising Covid-19 cases,” Galvez said.
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The Philippines initially received 1 million doses of the procured supplies in March while 1.5 million doses will arrive in April and another 2 million in May.
Meanwhile, the delivery of 17 million doses of vaccines developed by AstraZeneca procured by local government units and the private sector will begin in June with an initial batch of 1 million doses.
Galvez said the Philippines is expecting 10 to 20 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine developed by Russia’s Gamaleya Research Institute.
The Philippines recently signed a supply deal for 10 million doses of the Russian vaccine which is expected to arrive in April.
Meanwhile 20 million doses of jabs from US firm Moderna will be received by the Philippine with an initial batch of 194,000 doses to arrive in May
The Philippines signed a tripartite agreement where 13 million vaccines were secured by the Philippine government while the remaining 7 million will be given to the private sector.
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Meanwhile the government is slated to sign a supply agreement with Johnson and Johnson to procure 6 to 10 million doses of its Janssen vaccines expected to arrive by the third or fourth quarter.
A total of 30 million doses of vaccines from Novavax procured by the national government.
An additional 15 million doses procured by the local government units and private sector is also underway. The Novavax vaccines will likely arrive in the third or fourth quarter.
Moreover, The Philippines is negotiating to acquire 25 to 40 million doses of US pharmaceutical giant Pfizer-BioNTech.
Philippine Ambassador to the United States Jose Manuel Romualdez earlier said that the Philippines will receive its vaccines from Moderna and Pfizer “not too far away from now,” adding that the succeeding production of American brands will be for export.
Meanwhile 3 to 4 million Pfizer vaccines from the COVAX Facility will be delivered by the second quarter. (RA)
