1M doses of Sinovac arrive
ANOTHER batch of one million doses of COVID-19 vaccines from China’s Sinovac is scheduled to arrive in Manila today, as part of the government’s continuous effort to fight the killer virus.
The office of Manila International Airport Authority (MIAA) general manager Eddie V. Monreal said the latest shipment of one million doses of Sinovac vaccines is set to arrive Sunday morning on a Cebu Pacific Airlines flight 5J671 from Beijing.
Monreal said more shipments are expected to arrive at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) in the following weeks.
In a statement, Philippine Ambassador to China Chito Sta. Romana said the shipment is being prepared and checked by a Philippine embassy team to boost the country’s vaccine rollout.
“The shipment is being prepared and inspected by the Philippine Embassy team of First Secretary Winston Almeda and Attaché Dada Aromin at a refrigerated warehouse in Daxing, Beijing,” Sta. Romana said.
The new batch of Sinovac jabs, procured by the Department of Health, raises to 6.5 million the total number of vaccines from the Chinese brand.
Of this number, one million doses were donated by the Chinese government.
The Chinese brand accounts for a large portion of the country’s total COVID-19 vaccine at 5.5 million doses.
The Philippines received a total of 8,329,050 doses of COVID-19 vaccines from various brands.
Some 2.556 million doses of AstraZeneca vaccine and 193,050 from Pfizer have arrived through the vaccine-sharing platform COVAX, while 80,000 doses were procured from Russia’s Gamaleya Institute.
At least 3.4 million doses of vaccine are expected to arrive this June.
Records showed that as of June 2, the government has administered over 5.38 million vaccine shots , including the 4,088,422 first doses. A total of 1,293,750 people have completed the two-dose shots.
