The Philippines postponed the supposed roll out of COVID-19 vaccination for children aged five to 11 due to delay in the vaccine delivery.
“The roll out for vaccinating children aged five-11 years old will be postponed for a few days due to logistical challenges,” the DOH said in a statement on Thursday, Feb. 3.
The COVID-19 vaccination for the said age group was supposed to start on Friday, Feb. 4.
The arrival of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines, which will be used for this age group, was delayed. About 780,000 vaccine doses were supposed to be delivered on Thursday, Feb. 3.
“The FDA-approved Pfizer vaccines will be arriving on the evening of Friday, Feb. 4, 2022,” the DOH said.
“To ensure adequate preparation and distribution of the Pfizer vaccines allocated for children aged 5 to 11 years old, the COVID-19 vaccination of five to 11 year old will instead begin on 7 February (Monday),” it added.
Presidential adviser for COVID-19 response Vince Dizon also announced that the vaccination rollout will be postponed.
“The launching of the pediatric vaccination which was supposedly scheduled tomorrow (Friday, Feb. 4) and Saturday, will be moved to Monday,” said Dizon in an event in Bacolod.
“ a logistical issue from DHL. DHL actually emailed the Department of Health stating that there were some problems with the plane coming here—bringing the five to 11 (years old) vaccines. But they are due to arrive. Instead of tonight (Feb. 3), tomorrow night (Feb. 4),” said Dizon.