The Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) has stepped up its vaccination drive among its personnel in Eastern Visayas with the inoculation of 50 of its workers in the region.
In a statement DILG Region 8 Office said the priorities are those under A2 and A3 categories as well as increased booster doses under the A4 category.
Senior citizens aged 60 years old are under the A2 group while persons with comorbidities and frontline personnel belong to the A3 and A4 bracket respectively.
Four Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP) and 20 Department of Health (DOH) administered the booster shots.
As of Sept. 20, the government said more or less 165,005,000 total Covid-19 vaccine doses have been administered throughout the country, with 72,932,489 being fully vaccinated, 18,989,775 having first booster doses and 2,703,838 getting the second booster shots.
A substantial proportion of the country’s population needs to be vaccinated to lower the overall spread of the virus in the whole population and to safely achieve herd immunity against Covid-19.
Earlier, DILG Secretary Benjamin ‘Benhur’ Abalos Jr. directed the local government units (LGUs) to intensify their respective vaccination efforts and inoculate booster doses to the eligible population.
He said the national government will persist in undertaking the President’s directive to conduct another rollout of booster shots with the resumption of in-person classes as cited in his State of the Nation Address (SONA).
Abalos stressed that the LGUs are integral in communicating the importance of the Covid-19 boosters to overcome vaccination hesitancy and increase the number of eligible citizens that are boosted.
Through DILG Memorandum dated July 15, 2022, abalos directed the LGUs to ramp up their vaccination efforts and instructed them to urge and reach out to all their unvaccinated and booster-eligible constituents; address vaccine hesitancy, particularly in rural and far-flung areas; bridge the gap between vaccination services and communities to make it easier for the people to get inoculated; and, avoid vaccine wastage by ensuring that all available vaccines are administered in their respective areas.
DOLE too
The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) has joined the ‘PinasLakas’ booster campaign of the Department of Health (DOH) in a move to maintain what it described as a wall of immunity against Covid-19.
A total of 62 employees and personnel of DOLE Regional Office No. V has received their booster jabs on the first day of their region-nationwide booster campaign on Friday, Sept. 30, according to DOLE Region 5 Director Ma. Zenaida A. Angara-Campita.
“We continue to urge our own workforce, who have not yet received their Covid-19 vaccine booster shots, to take advantage of the free vaccines, which provide not only protection for themselves and their families, but also for our clients considering that we are front liners in providing assistance to the public,” said Campita.
To date, a total of 99.9 percent of the workforce of the DOLE Bicol Regional Office, including six provincial field offices, have already administered their full jabs of Covid-19 immunization.
Campita urged all employees of DOLE in the region to support the ‘PinasLakas’ campaign under the direction of President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. to adhere to the objectivity of a healthy and safer nation.
“With these efforts, combating the COVID-19 virus and other vaccine-preventable diseases will be easier for the country,” Campita uttered.
"As vaccination remains the best solution to the global pandemic caused by Covid-19, the DOH continues to encourage Filipinos to get vaccinated as vaccines are proven safe and effective against the dreaded virus," she added.