Rep. Alfred Vargas of the 5th District of Quezon City has lauded Mayor Joy Belmonte for including 300,000 senior citizens, 20,000 persons with disabilities (PWDs) and 703,000 indigents under the QC ProtekTodo plan.
“Being one of the biggest cities in Metro Manila, we must all work together and make sure that our residents are protected from the pandemic. Our Mayor has a good plan and the sooner we are able to implement vaccination of a majority of our residents, a certain level of normalcy will be reached which will allow fully opening up business in line with President Duterte’s vision,” said Vargas, chair, social services committee in Congress.
QC ProtekTodo also has a communication plan set in place to counter hesitancy and promote vaccine confidence. In a survey of 46,683 residents conducted by Quezon City over 56 percent have already indicated that they are willing to be vaccinated or 26,420 and 15,721 remain undecided.
The Quezon City government has entered into a contract with Zuellig Pharma for the distribution of the vaccines across the 26 vaccination centers from its warehouses which can accommodate 3.6 m dozes. Transportation of which will only take 30 minutes per site.
The actor-producer also said that the Quezon City government has already paid the 20 percent down payment to Astrazeneca for 1.1 million dozes of the vaccine. “Dahil top priority ni Mayor Joy ang kalusugan sa Quezon City, tuloy ang libreng bakuna para sa mga residente ng Quezon City!”
Vargas however warned Quezon City residents to not let their guard down and stay vigilant until the vaccines arrive. “We should continue to be careful against COVID-19 and follow all health protocols until we are able to reach herd immunity.”
According to Health Secretary Francisco Duque, vaccines have been delayed due to global market demand. The Philippines lags behind other Southeast Asian countries in the implementation of vaccination programs vs COVID-19.
QC is ready to vaccinate its residents based on a comprehensive plan that has been developed under the leadership of Mayor Belmonte, according to QC Councilor PM Vargas.
The QC Protektodo vaccination plan has three major phases to be implemented across all the districts of the city: 1. pre vaccination; 2. vaccination and 3. post vaccination. Over 1,047,027 individuals have been placed and registered on the priority list: 3,292 government health workers and 18,325 private health workers are also on the top of those to be vaccinated in line with the IATF priorities.
Also in line for priority vaccination are 1,410 government and Barangay officials and 20,000 law enforcers. Vaccination will be done in 26 locations across the 6 districts where it will take 45 minutes per vaccination, 30 minutes of which is for observation.