The government aims to complete the vaccination of minors by December this year to protect them from severe COVID-19 infection, vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. said Monday night during President Rodrigo Duterte's “Talk to the People” briefing.
The Department of Health reported there were around 1.2 million children with comorbidities aged 12 to 17 years old nationwide who would be inoculated during the period.
Local government units in the National Capital Region have started vaccination of minors with comorbidities last week.
Galvez said this would help recover the lost time of children after almost two years being restricted at home.
Quoting psychologists, Galvez said around 300 percent to 400 percent of children were suffering from depression, pointing out that the government is seeking to inoculate 90 percent of teachers, students and personnel in schools before the end of November.
Local government units must also ramp up their first dosage to 70 percent by the end of November, he said.
The vaccine czar, meanwhile, said they were expecting to achieve 100 million doses of vaccines this October as 3 million more doses were expected to be delivered this week.
Based on his data, the Philippines received over 97,678,340 of various vaccines since its inoculation program began in March.
