The country will receive from Bahrain an additional 240,000 doses of Covid-19 vaccines, 40,000 doses of which are Pfizer’s pediatric vaccines, the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) has announced.
In a statement posted on its Twitter account, the DFA said the donation of Covid-19 vaccine doses for adults and minors aged 5 to 11 came after Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. spoke with his counterpart Bahraini Foreign Minister Dr. Abdullatif bin Rashid Al Zayani on Wednesday, April 13.
“Bahraini FM Dr Abdullatif bin Rashid Al Zayani told Sec Locsin during their phone call today that Bahrain intends to donate 240k COVID-19 vaccine doses to PH, 40k of which will be Pfizer doses for kids,” the DFA tweeted.
During their phone conversation, the two officials also discussed the possible establishment of an Embassy of Bahrain in the Philippines.
The DFA said the discussion between Locsin and Zayani was “in view of growing bilateral ties, largely driven by the vital contributions of the Filipino community in Bahraini society.”
On Twitter, Locsin also made known Bahrain‘s Covid-19 vaccine donations to the Philippines.
“Teddy, I got 240,000 vaccines from Bahrain yesterday. Please make sure they get through,” the DFA chief said, retweeting the post of Dr. Ted Herbosa.
Herbosa, special adviser to the National Task Force against Covid-19, said the National Covid-19 Vaccination Operations Center is currently drafting guidelines for the rollout of second booster dose.
According to the Department of Health (DOH, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had granted the emergency use authorization (EUA) for second booster shots for senior citizens, immunocompromised individuals, and frontline health workers.
As of April 4, more than 66.2 million people of the country’s 110-million population have been fully vaccinated against Covid-19. The DOH appealed to 46.8 million people to get their booster shot because of the new variant Omicron XE threat.