Philippine General Hospital Director Dr. Gerardo "Gap" Legaspi said Wednesday, Jan. 12, that vaccines are the "game-changer" in the fight against coronavirus disease (COVID-19).
"Of course, the vaccination is probably the game-changer. The vaccination the booster are the game-changer. That's why we're seeing a different scenario all together even for patients and healthcare workers as well," Legaspi said in an interview with ANC Philippines.
"When we had COVID positive healthcare workers, just 30 percent of them got admitted. Now I can probably count with my fingers in one hand how many got admitted from our 973 COVID workers that became positive. It's really different now," he added.
Citing initial studies in Israel about administering a fourth dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, Legaspi said that it could be "beneficial to those who received it" and noted that "so far, no harm was seen."
"We are guided by science, we should be guided by good science. I think as soon as the data shows that it is efficacious and doesn't carry too much risks in giving it and the benefit outweighs the risk, I think we'll be the first one to give it to our healthcare workers," he furthered.
Legaspi, however, cautioned the public amid reports of people getting more than the prescribed three doses of COVID-19 vaccines.
"Right now, we don't know what the effect is, but these are new vaccines, they are still unknown. The data will probably come in the middle of this year or late this year. We don't know what the effect of four vaccine doses will be, that's why we really have to be careful because the process occurs within our body and we don't see it," he said.
"I think we really should wait for data before we decide on any unknown intervention for ourselves."