The Philippines is expected to have a steady supply of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccines after the national government completed five of the seven procurement contracts with international manufacturers.
Secretary Carlito Galvez Jr., vaccine czar and National Task Force (NTF) Against COVID-19 chief implementer, said Friday, April 16, that the latest procurement contract it closed was with Russia's Gamaleya Research Institute for the delivery of Sputnik V vaccines.
Two separate financing contracts were signed "earlier this week" for the delivery of 20 million doses of Sputnik V, with the first tranche consisting of 500,000 doses expected to be shipped within the month, he said.
The government previously signed supply agreements with four other vaccine manufacturers namely Chinese firm Sinovac Biotech, British-Swedish company AstraZeneca, American firm Moderna, and India-based company Novavax. So far, some 25 million doses from Sinovac have already been secured--the delivery started last month.
Meanwhile, 17 million doses of Astrazeneca vaccines, which were procured by the private sector and local government units (LGUs), are scheduled to be delivered to the country beginning in June. This is aside from the earlier commitment made by the Covax facility, an international coalition led by the World Health Organization, where it intended to ship in around four million doses of AstraZeneca vaccines to the country between April to early May.
A separate supply agreement was also inked by the government with Moderna for the delivery of 20 million vaccine doses, of which, 13 million doses will go to the government while seven million doses were secured by the private sector. The initial deliveries of Moderna jabs will start in May or June.
Lastly, Galvez said that Novavax will supply 30 million doses to the country while an additional 15 million doses are being negotiated by the private sector and LGUs.
"The volume that we have negotiated is very significant. While other will deliver this quarter to early third quarter, our main volume will arrive by August and that's the time we will open the vaccination to the general public," he said.
Galvez said the inoculation of the general public and adult population could be started in July. But the Philippines was affected by severe shortage of vaccines as manufacturing countries halted the export of the jabs and raw materials to expedite the vaccination of their own population.
At present, Galvez said the government is still negotiating with American manufacturers Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson to finally settle the remaining two vaccine procurements that underwent scrutiny from the Vaccine Expert Panel (VEP).
Around 25 to 40 million doses of Pfizer vaccines and six million doses of Johnson & Johnson jabs are expected to be procured by the government from the two American manufacturers.
The discussions with Pfizer covered the vaccines to be supplied through the Covax facility where around 2.4 million doses are set to be delivered this quarter, Galvez bared.
The vaccine czar said the supply agreement with Johnson & Johnson "is due to be completed soon."
On the other hand, he noted that Pfizer's logistical requirements are still being ironed out before the supply deal is signed.
The government aims to secure more than 140 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines for the inoculation of 50 to 70 million Filipinos in 2021.
This, Galvez said, will ensure that the country will achieve herd immunity by year-end as part of the government's containment strategy.