HEALTH Secretary Francisco Duque III said Sunday he will this week start visiting schools with students facing possible severe dengue cases after being administered with the controversial dengue vaccine Dengvaxia.
He told a forum he would go first to a Marikina school and also inspect certain schools in the rest of the National Capital Region, Regions 3 and 4-A and Cebu.
He said the visit was part of heightened monitoring efforts for the 837,000 schoolchildren given the vaccine.
Some inspections would be unannounced so he could check his regional staff’s compliance with the department’s risk communication strategies, such as the setting up of posters containing vital information on dengue immunization.
“We will start to do our regular visits and unannounced visits of the schools where we make sure that the DOH people on the ground are able to follow what the DOH central office has asked them to do,” said Duque.
Health Undersecretary Rolando Enrique Domingo said children would be given letters for their parents.
He said the letters would contain updates on the vaccine, a reminder to watch out for dengue symptoms, and information on medical help they could seek should such symptoms arise.
He also said Duque had already asked Dengvaxia’s manufacturer Sanofi Pasteur to come up with a “test kit” that would determine if a patient’s blood had dengue virus,
“The Secretary has demanded that Sanofi have this test available at the soonest possible time so we would know exactly who among the children are at risk,” he said.
Duque has also demanded that Sanofi take back its remaining vaccine stocks and refund the corresponding amount so the government could use it for the potential care for immunized children, if needed.
He reiterated that his department welcomed and and would cooperate with the investigations into the vaccine currently being carried out by the Senate and the House of Representatives and the cases filed by groups such as the Volunteers Against Crime and Corruption and Gabriela.
But his department will focus its efforts on post-vaccination monitoring for the 837,000 schoolchildren who received the vaccine, and that it will not file cases against Sanofi.
“We don’t want to be filing the cases ourselves because our plates are full, we have to watch out for 837,000 students who have been vaccinated,” Domingo said.
