Phase 1 of real-world study on COVID-19 vaccines to kick off at PGH
The first phase study on the real-world effectiveness of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccines will kick of at the Philippine General Hospital (PGH), the project leader said Thursday, June 3.

Dr. Regina Berba, head of PGH's infectious control unit, said the study involving different vaccine brands will be conducted in three phases.
The first phase will involve healthcare workers.
"There will be two surveillance systems, we will watch them closely over time. Yung isa, (The first one is) antibody testing. Yung isa, (The other one) real-world, magkaka-COVID ba sila o hindi (will they develop COVID-19 or not)," Berba said in an interview with ANC.
She added that the hospital is eyeing to get over 20,000 individuals for the study.
"We received different kinds of brands so we will look at the effectiveness of these different brands and we will look across different kinds of populations. Una (First) healthcare workers, tapos (then) elderly individuals, people with comorbidities, and a segment of the sampling with essential workers with no comorbidities," she added.
Berba said the second phase of the study will involve local communities and may happen next month. The last phase of the study will involve all regions in the country and may start in the next two months.
The Philippines has been using United Kingdom's AstraZeneca, American brand Pfizer, China-based Sinovac, and Russia's Sputnik V in its vaccination program against COVID-19 that began on March 1.
As of May 30, the country has administered over 5.1 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines. Of this number, 3.9 million are first doses and 1.2 million are second doses.