An official of the World Health Organization (WHO) has commended the Philippines’ COVID-19 vaccination rollout as more than 11 million vaccine doses were already administered nationwide.

WHO Country Representative to the Philippines Dr. Rabindra Abeyasinghe said that the Philippines will most likely achieve the organization’s goal with regards to vaccination.

“It's been remarkable. We're now, I think, at almost 12 million people vaccinated and the vaccination program which began in March, in just three months...and that also with limited access to vaccines...If you have (more) vaccines, you can go much faster," Abeyasinghe said in an ABS-CBN News Channel interview on Tuesday, July 6.

"We commend the efforts of the government and private sector, everybody who is contributing to try to access vaccines," he added.

Abeyasinghe said that the WHO is encouraging countries to vaccinate at least 10 percent of their population by September, 40 percent by the end of this year, and 70 percent by June 2022.

“For the Philippines, you have more ambitious goals. I think you are now at more than 10 percent of your population already vaccinated with the first dose. About four to five percent (are) already fully vaccinated, and we are looking at significantly large quantities of vaccines arriving over the next few weeks and months,” he said.

“We believe that you will exceed the 10 percent before September. And certainly, you may exceed (the) 40 percent threshold before (the) end of year,” he added.

He noted that countries need to vaccinate at least 85 percent of their population amid the threat of coronavirus variants.

“With the emergence of the more transmissible variants, the proportion that needs to be vaccinated has been estimated to be significantly higher,” said Abeyasinghe.

"We’re now looking at approximately 85 percent or beyond. That’s why we now advocate not to talk about herd immunity but talk about how many people can be protected," he added.

A total of 11,708,029 doses of COVID-19 vaccines have been administered in the country.

The DOH said that 2,868,905 people are now fully vaccinated, while 8,839,124 received their first dose so far.

Recognize vaccines approved by WHO

Abeyasinghe also urged countries to recognize all COVID-19 vaccines that were already approved by the international organization.

All vaccines that were given emergency use listing (EUL) status by the WHO must be recognized equally, said Abeyasinghe.

Some countries only “require” specific brands of vaccines, he said.

The vaccines approved by WHO include those made by Pfizer-BioNtech, AstraZeneca, Moderna, Serum Institute of India, Johnson & Johnson, Sinopharm, and Sinovac Biotech.

“WHO and COVAX and all our partners came out with a very strong statement a few days ago, urging for equal recognition of vaccines if they have been granted WHO emergency use listing,” he said.

Abeyasinghe emphasized that the WHO “emergency use listing procedure does a very stringent evaluation of the vaccines.”

“If they have received that emergency use listing status, we are urging countries to recognize people who have received those vaccines as fully vaccinated and not limit it to commercial brands...but to respect all WHO EUL vaccines in that category,” he added.