With international drug manufacturers still overwhelmed by new orders for the coronavirus vaccine, tripartite agreements for securing COVID-19 jabs have been put on hold, National Task Force Against COVID-19 spokesman Restituto Padilla said Sunday.
Vaccine makers Moderna, AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson were still not accepting new tripartite agreements, Padilla said.
"Moderna and AstraZeneca have already said they do not want to enter into agreements until they finish their current delivery. The same is true of Johnson & Johnson,” he said.
This comes in the wake of Senator Majority Leader Juan Miguel Zubiri's call to the Senate to probe reports that tripartite agreements for vaccine procurement have not been signed.
This developed as the Philippines received one million doses of procured Sinovac COVID-19 vaccines on Saturday, together with the second tranche of 260,800 Sinopharm vaccine doses donated by the Chinese government.
A total of 26.5 million doses of Sinovac have so far been delivered to the country, of which 24.6 million doses were procured by the national government.
The 260,800 doses of Sinopharm vaccines complete the one-million donationcommitted by the Chinese government.
Sinopharm vaccines have already received an Emergency Use Listing from the World Health Organization, as well as an Emergency Use Authorization from the Philippines’ Food and Drug Administration.
In Quezon City, the city government has recorded close to 500,000 vaccines administered during the enhanced community quarantine from Aug. 6 to 20 in Metro Manila.
Mayor Joy Belmonte said the city was able to administer 493,000 vaccines to city residents and workers during the two week-lockdown.
From Aug. 6 to 20, 415,923 first doses were administered, while there were 77,077 second dose vaccines recorded for the A1 to A5 priority groups under the QCProtekTodo Vaccination Program.
Padilla pointed out that vaccine makers are not ready to accept new agreements even as the Vaccination Program Act of 2021 allows local government units to purchase their vaccines through multi-party agreements.
"There are many suppliers saying that they are not ready to enter into a tripartite agreement for now because they have yet to fulfill their pending orders," Padilla said over Dobol B TV.
Belmonte said the city government has intensified and maximized every opportunity to vaccinate its residents and workers during the ECQ period.
“Every vaccine we jab is a life we save. So we made full use of all our registration processes — barangay-assisted, QCVaxEasy Portal, company-assisted, homeowners’ association-assisted and bakuna nights to reach our target individuals and vaccinate them during the heightened quarantine period when we were given an increased and stable supply of vaccines,” she said.
As of Aug. 21, the city government has administered 2,143,698 vaccine doses.
Over 1.4 million individuals or 86.36 percent of the 1.7 million target population have already received their first doses.
Over 675,000 or 42.06 percent of the same target population have been inoculated with the second dose.
The mayor said they are determined to reach population protection by setting the target to 1.7 million or 80 percent of its adult population, especially during the surge of cases.
“The national government recognizes that Quezon City has the largest city population in the entire country and cumulatively, the most number of cases. With that, they continue to support our vaccination program by providing an appropriate number of vaccine doses to us,” Belmonte said.