Over 160,000 doses of Covid-19 vaccines were “wasted” due to container breakage, improper handling and accidents, according to the National Task Force (NTF) Against Covid-19 chief implementer Carlito Galvez.
In a televised interview with PTV on Monday, NTF chief said the bulk or 148,000 of the said doses were destroyed after a fire damaged a storage facility in Zamboanga del Sur last month.
The Department of Health (DOH) and the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) are currently investigating why such a large number of jabs were stored in the facility and were not immediately distributed to its intended beneficiaries.
The remaining 12,000 vaccine doses were wasted due to breakage of container vials and power disruptions, which affected the temperature in the storage facilities of some of the said jabs, according to Galvez.
The vaccine czar, however, assured that the said “wastage” falls within internationally accepted standards that range from1 percent to 3 percent of a country’s overall vaccine supplies.
He noted that over 160,000 wasted vaccines in the country is less than 1 percent of the government’s 110 million Covid-19 jabs.
Galvez congratulated the National Vaccine Operation Center for keeping the vaccine wastage at minimal.
“While we want not to waste [any vaccine doses], there are calamities we just can’t avoid,” Galvez said.
As of last Sunday, the government was able to administer 64.1 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines nationwide.
To further increase these figures, Galvez said they are now pushing for a three-day National Vaccine Day, which will start on November 29, 2021.
“We want it to coincide with the National Heroes Day on November 30 since we want to send a message to the public that those who get vaccinated are heroes,” Galvez said.
The Filipinos’ public acceptance of the coronavirus vaccine has “significantly” increased, he added, citing the latest survey data showing that vaccine acceptance among Filipinos has increased from 46 percent to 64 percent.
Galvez also cited the importance of having a continuous vaccination information drive to further address vaccine hesitancy. Samuel P. Medenilla