The hopes of providing a “better” Christmas for the Filipinos inspired the national government to further improve the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccination program as it exceeded its expectations for the month of October.
From Oct. 1 to 31, a total of 34,887,870 doses have been delivered to the country, according to data from the National Task Force (NTF) Against COVID-19 which were analyzed by the Manila Bulletin.
This includes the 2,098,980 doses that would arrive around 10 p.m. Sunday from the donations of the United States via the global vaccine sharing initiative COVAX facility.
The tally surpassed the projection made by Sec. Carlito Galvez Jr., vaccine czar and NTF chief implementer, that around 29.5 million doses would arrive in the said month.
Nearly 50 percent of the delivered vaccines or 15,161,350 doses were procured by the national government from various vaccine manufacturers.
Meanwhile, COVAX facility contributed 11,907,780 doses from the donations of United States and Germany. The private sector and local government units (LGUs) also bought 4,855,140 doses while other friendly nations such as Brunei, China, and Japan donated 2,963,600 doses via direct vaccine sharing.
In terms of vaccine brands, United States-based Pfizer pharmaceutical company transported 19,058,130 doses, making it the biggest contributor to the vaccine inventory this month.
There were also 5,714,300 doses of AstraZeneca from the United Kingdom; 5.5 million doses of Sinovac-CoronaVac from China; 3,495,440 doses of Moderna from US; and 1,120,000 doses of Sputnik V from Russia that came in.
In total, the government accomplished its goal of securing 100 million doses by the end of October as the vaccine inventory now reached 106,212,460 doses.
It also accomplished its target of fully vaccinating 25 million Filipinos by the end of October. The national tally of vaccinated individuals are as follows: 31,862,067 who had their first dose and 27,272,169 who were fully vaccinated as of Oct. 30.
In the past 30 days, a total of 7,472,109 individuals were injected with their first dose while 5,711,374 others were fully vaccinated as the inoculation of pediatric sector or those aged 12 to 17 kicked off last Oct. 15 in Metro Manila.
The tally would further increase as the government plans to expand the inoculation of the pediatric sector nationwide on Nov. 3, while the administration of third booster to healthcare workers and individuals with comorbidities is also being planned for rollout before the year ends.
However, the government did not meet its target of administering one million doses across all vaccination sites in one day.
The daily vaccination output only ranged from 400,000 to 500,000 doses while the highest recorded daily output reached around only around 700,000 doses.
Despite failing to hit its vaccination target, Galvez raised the goal from one million to 1.5 million administered doses per day so that the government could reach its target of inoculating 50 million to 70 million Filipinos by the end of 2021.
“We look forward to seeing each and every LGU in the country hitting their daily jab targets in the days ahead as we collectively work towards reaching and sustaining the 1.5 million jab rate that we hope to achieve within this quarter,” Galvez said last Oct. 28.
“Our goal of having a better Christmas is still attainable,” he added.