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Philippines
Thursday, March 28, 2024

PAO promises to pursue aiding victims despite budget cut

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Despite the removal of P19.5 million from  its maintenance and other operating expense budget, the Public Attorney’s Office vows not to  stop to help the victims of Dengvaxia.

PAO chief Persida Rueda-Acosta said PAO was able to serve over 1,000 children who received Dengvaxia vaccine shots “even until 2018” in last week’s three-day free medical-dental-optical outreach program.

“The beneficiaries came from two barangays in Quezon City’s District 2,” she said.

Those who availed of the program presented their yellow cards as proof that they received partial or complete shots of the Dengvaxia vaccines.

“I was shocked to see that there are some who were just inoculated in 2018,” she said.

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She vowed to pursue extending assistance not only to the kin of the children whose deaths were linked to Dengvaxia, but also to children whose lives are still at risk of having severe dengue.

Parents of children who died after receiving Dengvaxia shots through PAO filed multiple counts of reckless imprudence resulting in homicide against former Health Secretary Janette Garian, Health Secretary Francisco Duque III, Philippine Children’s Medical Center executive director Julius Lecciones, other former and active health officials, and executives of Sanofi Pasteur Inc. and its distributor Zuellig Pharma Corp. before the Department of Justice.

Civil suits were also filed with the Quezon City courts.

Albay Rep. Edcel Lagman and Garin, now Iloilo representative, along with other lawmakers, “inserted” a special provision in the 2020 national budget prohibiting PAO from using its MOOE budget to fund the operation of its Forensic Laboratory Division, according to PAO.

PAO had been active in its autopsy of remains of school children believed to suffer from severe dengue after the inoculation of the vaccine.

In November 2017, Sanofi Pasteur Inc., the vaccine manufacturer, released a statement that Dengvaxia posed higher risks of severe dengue to people without prior dengue infection. 

In 2016, Garin implemented a school-based mass vaccination of Dengvaxia to 830,000 children.

In the late 2017, the Department of Health suspended the program due to reports that several children died from various complications supposedly attributed to the anti-dengue vaccine.  

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