DAVAO CITY — The city government of Davao on Tuesday morning, March 2, received 12,000 Covid-19 vaccines, its first trance which will be inoculated to front liners in the region.
The doses of vaccines landed at Davao International Airport around 6:40 a.m. through Philippine Airlines PR 8809.
After the vaccines were unloaded from the plane, it was immediately transferred to a waiting refrigerated van and rush to Department of Health 11 (DOH 11) cold storage facility.
Dr. Annabelle Yumang, the DOH XI regional director said the 12,000 doses are just the instalment for the initial 16,000 doses for 8,000 health workers to be vaccinated.
“So, naga paabot ta sa atong balanse na 4,000 (So, we are still waiting for the remaining 4,000),” she said.
Yumam said the priority health workers to be inoculated for these vaccines are from Southern Philippines Medical Center (SPMC), Davao Regional Medical Center and privater tertiary hospitals in thr region.
She said the kick off vaccination for the medical frontliners will be on March 5 to be led by officials from the Inter-Agency Task Force Against COVID-19.
Meanwhile, SPMC officer-in-charge Dr. Ricardo Audan said about 75 percent of their 5,600 health workers are ready to be vaccinated.
Audan said the said percentage came from their survey they conducted last Monday after the arrival of the vaccines donated by the People’s Republic of China.
He said all systems go for the inoculation of their personnel and they will still conduct a simulation exercise before the big day.