Pass the word.
San Juan City Mayor Francis Zamora believes that aside from the local government's campaign to urge its citizens to be vaccinated, "word of mouth" or the passing on of the vaccinee's good experience about the vaccine is also an excellent way to boost the people's confidence to get the jab.
"Honestly, during the start, there was some challenge in terms of vaccinating. But since we have vaccinated almost half of our qualified population, for me, what really helps is the word of mouth as these people are vaccinated. In fact close to 39,000 of them," Zamora said in an interview with CNN Philippines.
"Once they go home to their families, they share their story regarding their experience, and because we have not recorded any single abnormal side effect or adverse reaction here in San Juan, I believe the experience of our vaccinees really helps in terms of increasing confidence in the vaccine process," he added.
Zamora said that the local government has been relentless in urging the public to be vaccinated against COVID-19 and in fighting the spread of fake news, especially about the vaccines' side effects.
"We also focus on information and education campaigns so that people will not worry because a lot of news they hear are fake news when it comes to adverse reaction and side effect. A lot of these information are false. So we have to correct these by educating and informing them," the mayor said.
As of June 12, the local government has already vaccinated 38,296 San Juaneños or 44.8 percent of its target population to achieve herd immunity.