The country has logged a new record-high of nearly 230,000 vaccinations in a single day as it nears the four million-mark in administered coronavirus disease (COVID-19) shots, Secretary Carlito Galvez Jr. bared Saturday, May 22.
A total of 229,769 vaccine doses were administered on May 20, the highest daily vaccination rate since the immunization program was launched on March 1, according to Galvez, vaccine czar and chief implementer of the National Task Force (NTF) Against COVID-19.
The new record broke the previous high of 120,529 jabs on May 15.
"We are very happy with this milestone as we were able to double the number of jabs in less than a week. I am very confident that with the current pace that we have, we can breach the four million mark by early next week," Galvez said.
As of May 20, a total of 3,718,308 doses have been administered nationwide to priority groups A1 or frontline healthcare workers, A2 or senior citizens, A3 or persons with comorbidities, and select A4 or economic frontliners.
Early this month, Galvez said the government is eyeing to administer at least two million shots in May following the steady arrival of vaccines. This target is twice the total number of shots administered in March and April.
"We are now moving past the 'crawl' stage as we begin to walk. However, this is not yet enough as our main goal is to 'run' where we will be able to administer at least half a million doses or more daily. And I am certain that if we keep this momentum, along with the continuous delivery of vaccines throughout the country, we can make this happen," Galvez said optimistically.
The government is aiming to vaccinate 58 to 70 million Filipinos by the end of the year to achieve herd immunity.
"The pace of the ongoing vaccination we are witnessing right now is unprecedented. We are happy to see that all sectors of society are working together to achieve our common goal of herd immunity by the end of November," the vaccine czar said.
"By June, we will expect to have higher outputs when we all join hands in accelerating the vaccination and open our target population from the economic and government frontliners (A4) and indigent/poor communities (A5)," he added.
By third quarter, vaccine shipments to the country are expected to increase to at least 15 to 20 million doses monthly.
"We are on track with our vaccine rollout, and we can assure the public that as we scale up our vaccine procurement, we are also ramping up our vaccination rate. Through this, we can all have a better Christmas this year,” Galvez said.