Senator Sherwin Gatchalian on Monday, August 16 pressed for a faster completion of a centralized database of fully vaccinated individuals saying the issue of a lack of a unified vaccination card is something that should have been addressed by the government before.
Gatchalian lamented there are individuals who are taking advantage of the lack of database citing reports of some residents getting booster shots even with a limited supply of vaccines.
The senator said those whose inoculation were shouldered by the private sector or private sector employer-companies should be included in the national database.
So far, he noted only local government units (LGUs) have been enjoined by the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) on the submission of a list of their residents or constituents vaccinated against COVID-19 in their respective localities for the inclusion in the digital vaccine certificates.
“Dapat matagal na itong centralized database dahil dito natin makikita kung merong nag-doble sa pagpapabakuna. Hindi natin maiiwasan minsan na merong ilan na hindi lang isa ang address. Nakakalungkot na merong nananamantala ng sitwasyon (The centralized database should have started way before, because here we will see if somebody got vaccinated twice. We can’t do anything if there are some who have been using different addresses),” Gatchalian pointed out.
“‘Yung iba, nagpabakuna na sa isang LGU tapos nagpabooster shot pa sa ibang LGU. Kung may centralized database tayo, mabilis at maiiwasan ang ganitong pananamantala lalo na’t marami pa ang hindi nababakunahan, (Some have taken jabs with a certain LGU then had booster shots in another LGU. If we have a centralized database, we can expedite and avoid this kind of activity especially since there are still many people who have not yet been vaccinated),” the senator said.
The lawmaker noted under that the tripartite agreement the private sector entered into with the government and allowed them to procure anti-COVID-19 vaccines, private sector companies are required to submit a list of vaccinated individuals for monitoring purposes.
He said this should be merged then with the vaccine administration system of the DICT for the planned digital or unified vaccine certificates for fully vaccinated individuals.
The Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) and the Department of Health (DOH) should start pooling all records to create a uniform vaccination card, so the government is already prepared when this becomes global standard.
“Sana meron na tayong single uniform vaccination card na gagamitin ng mga LGUs. Hindi talaga ire-recognize ng mga advanced countries ang individual vaccination cards ng iba't-ibang LGUs (I really hope we can have a single uniform vaccination card that LGUs can use. Advanced countries will really not recognize individual vaccination cards from different LGUs,” he added.
The VaxCertPH, which is being prepared by the DICT with the DOH and would be issued to fully vaccinated citizens in the country, is based on the World Health Organization’s (WHO) guidance and technical specifications for vaccination certificates.