City readies strategies for vaccination

BAGUIO CITY – The local government crafted the strategies that it will roll out for the implementation of the vaccination of residents to achieve herd immunity once the vaccines to be purchased by the city and provided by the national government and the private sector will be available.

City Health Officer Dr. Rowena Galpo stated that the priority recipients of the available vaccines will be frontline health workers, including those in public and private health facilities, public health workers, barangay health workers and members of the barangay health emergency response teams and those in other national government agencies; indigent senior citizens, remaining senior citizens, remaining indigent population, uniformed personnel and other private sector employees.

Based on the electronic immunization information registry, the city has an estimated population of 378,532 as of the present where 63 percent are 18 years old and above which is equivalent to 238,494 individuals.

She claimed that the people to be vaccinated must be 190,796 to achieve the required 80 percent her immunity, thus, the city needs some 381,592 does of the vaccine because of the 2 doses required for the recipients.

The medical officer said that there are at least 10 or 20 doses in a vial of the vaccine with a wastage factor of 1.05 for 1 dose, 1.11 for 5 and 10 dose vial and 1.18 for 1 20 dose vial.

Further, the city is targeting 100 vaccines per day, thus, the need for some 85 teams from the 16 district health centers to be able to aggressively implement the vaccination of the targeted population in 7 days.

Part of the city’s initiatives being undertaken by the city for the vaccination program roll out is the preparation of the risk communication and community engagement plan for advocacy, social mobilization, demand generation; supervision and monitoring; adverse effects management, surveillance and response plan; health care waste management plan; and human resource requirements.

Earlier, the city procured a number of freezers to enhance its vaccine storage capacity in preparation for the expected arrival of the vaccines that was purchased from Astra Zenica and for the expected implementation of the vaccination of the targeted population by the third quarter of this year.

Aside from the 380,000 doses of the vaccine that was procured by the city, Baguio stands to get some 30 percent of its vaccine requirements from the national government after the city was identified as one of the priority areas for the roll out of the government’s vaccination program and the donation from the private sector inside and outside the city.

The procured freezers will be arriving in the city by the end of the month to augment the city’s available freezers to be able to store the vaccines that will be delivered by the company for the implementation of the city’s vaccination program to achieve herd immunity of the population that will pave the way for the revitalization of the local economy that was heavily impacted by the Corona Virus Disease (COVID) 2019 pandemic. – Dexter A. See