As the government intensifies its inoculation efforts, Health Secretary Francisco T. Duque III on Monday, April 25, bared that 95 percent of Covid-19 deaths in the country are unvaccinated.
“We have had reports, the DOH (Department of Health), in terms of admissions sa (in) hospitals, so initially ‘yung mga admissions nakita na (we learned that) 85 percent of those who had severe and critical Covid-19 infection were the unvaccinated so malaki ‘yun (that’s a lot) and 95 percent of deaths were the unvaccinated,” he said during the virtual town hall forum organized by Go Negosyo.
“I understand this is representative of the national count. I cannot recall ano ba ang coverage nito, hindi naman lahat kundi representative sample ang ginawa (what’s the coverage of this, but it’s not all and representative sample was utilized),” the health secretary added.
Duque noted that senior citizens are the source of a large percentage of Covid-19 deaths in the country.
Such data, according to him, proves that vaccination and observance of minimum health and safety protocols are the most effective response against the Covid-19 pandemic.
Duque called on unvaccinated individuals to get the Covid-19 jab, saying it is safe and effective against the dreaded disease.
“So iyang vaccination huwag nating sayangin ang pagkakataon na ito ay talgang game-changer. Malaki ang tulong nito lalo na sa pag-iwas ng severe and critical cases lalo na sa mga matatanda (So let’s not waste our change to get vaccinated as this is a real game-changer. This massively helps in avoiding severe and critical cases especially to the elderlies), “ the health secretary appealed.
“The vaccine is our best long term solution to this pandemic,” he stressed.
Per Duque, 74.8 percent of the target population or around 67 million individuals have been vaccinated against Covid-19 as of April 21, 2022.