CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY – The City Health Office is now stepping up its vaccination drive, especially with many of its vaccine stocks expiring by the end of May.
In an online briefer on Wednesday, CHO medical officer Dr. Ted Yu Jr. confirmed that there are certain numbers of vaccine supply that will expire by the end of May.
Yu said the vaccination team, headed by Dr. William Bernardo, who is also the acting city health officer here, has been monitoring the city’s supply to assure that no vaccines allotted by the Department of Health will go to waste.
To speed up the vaccination drive, the CHO has set up vaccine rollouts not just in mega sites here, but also in accessible areas like Barangay Health Centers, in bus terminals, and drive-thru. The CHO has also resorted to house-to-house strategy.
"We have vaccines that will expire by the end of May and our vaccination team, headed by Dr. Bernardo, has been monitoring it. Do not worry, we have a daily monitoring and inventory system with regards to our vaccines," Yu said.
The said medical officer stressed that the city government has been continuously implementing daily inoculation against Covid-19, not just to improve the vaccination coverage, but also to utilize all the vaccines.
On April 5, a total of 1,426 individuals from different categories received their first and second doses and booster shots.
Overall, Cagayan de Oro already tallied 547,700 fully vaccinated individuals as of April 5. This is equivalent to 91.29 percent vaccination rate from the city's total target population of 599,929.
Of the fully vaccinated, 119,006 individuals or 22.71 percent from the target population already received their booster shots, while 29,170 individuals just received their first dose of vaccine.
Meanwhile, in five to 11 age group vaccination, the city has vaccinated a total of 15,980 children as of April 5 and 8,919 of these children were fully vaccinated.
The city government is aiming to boost the vaccination coverage of children aged five to 11 years old. Its target is 98,893. This target population was based on the masterlist of enrolled students to all public and private schools in the city.