The Agency Task Force (IATF) has approved on Friday the use of Sinovac vaccines against COVID-19 for healthcare workers.
In a press briefing, Health spokesperson Ma. Rosario Vergeire said members of the IATF approved the recommendation of experts from the National Immunization Technical Advisory Group (NITAG) and Department of Health-Technical Advisory Group (TAG), who recommended the use of Sinovac for healthcare workers.
“Just this morning we presented to the IATF and we got the approval already. So this would also be presented to the President but right now we can see all of these members approved the NITAG recommendation already,” Vergeire said.
The Department of Health (DOH) said that Sinovac “will be beneficial for the healthcare workers.”
Clinical data showed that Sinovac is 50 percent effective in preventing mild symptoms, and 100 percent effective to moderate and severe symptoms.
“Given this evidence, the NITAG and the TAG have deemed it sufficient to recommend the use of the vaccine for healthcare workers as it bears to reiterate that our goal for prioritizing healthcare workers for vaccination is to reduce morbidity and mortality among their group while they maintain the most critical essential health services,” Vergeire said.
The Food and Drug Administration’s Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) also showed that the Chinese-made vaccines are effective in reducing deaths caused by COVID-19.
The recommendation, however, has yet to be approved by President Rodrigo Duterte.
Earlier, FDA Director-General Eric Domingo said the vaccine’s efficacy rate on healthcare workers stands at 50.4%, which makes it not the best vaccine to be given to medical frontliners who are exposed to COVID-19 patients
The first batch of COVID-19 vaccines manufactured by Chinese pharmaceutical company Sinovac Biotech is scheduled to arrive in the country on Sunday, Feb. 28, according to Malacañang.
Presidential Spokesperson Secretary Harry Roque announced this in a press briefing on Thursday noon. “Inaasahan na darating sa araw ng Linggo… ang Sinovac kaya excited na tayong lahat,” Roque stated.
Sinovac general manager Helen Yang said they were working very closely with the Chinese customs bureau to clear the shipment of 600,000 doses that will be donated by Beijing to the Philippine government.
