Presidential Adviser for Entrepreneurship Joey Concepcion urged the public anew to get vaccinated against Covid-19 as 27 million doses of the vaccines intended to fight the virus will expire in July this year.

In a statement, Concepcion emphasized the urgency for Filipinos to get vaccinated or get their booster shots if they are already eligible.

"Let's not allow 27 million doses of the Covid vaccine to go to waste," he said.

"It's money the Philippines can't afford to waste," he added, pointing out that the country has recently breached the P12-trillion mark in its debt for the first time, primarily due to massive borrowing in the last two years for its pandemic response efforts.

The Go Negosyo founder has been pushing for mandatory booster cards by June this year to encourage Filipinos to get their booster shots.

"Time is of the essence. This is why I am calling it out now while there is still time before these vaccines expire," he said.

"If we don't use these vaccines, we will have wasted the Filipino taxpayers' money," he added.

The Philippines has borrowed P2 trillion, much of it going to vaccines. It has so far received more than 237 million vaccine doses, with some 140.7 million already administered.

According to Concepcion, the government needs to convince the public to get vaccinated as many people have already become complacent.

"We need to push a little, and we need to do the groundwork now. People have become complacent and no longer feel that they need to booster," he said.

"What they do not see is that the real danger is in the second half of the year," he added.

As of March 22, there are 65,343,446 Filipinos who have been fully vaccinated, but only 11,629,565 booster shots have been administered. This means only 13 percent of the eligible population have received their booster shots.

Concepcion noted that the private sector also bought its own supplies of Covid-19 vaccines through the A Dose of Hope tripartite agreement.

"We shared these with the government because we know that vaccines are the solution to battling this pandemic," he said.

"We wouldn't have managed to keep our hospitalization rates low and open up the economy without the vaccines," he added.

Concepcion further added that the Philippines is now one of the countries in Asia enjoying low average daily attack rates, or the seven-day average number of cases per 100,000, and healthcare utilization remain low.

He warned that a double-whammy awaits should Filipinos let down their guard.

"By the second half of the year, the majority of the population will have waning immunity. If cases rise, we will lock down again. And if the conflict in Ukraine drags on, we will lock down in the midst of rising commodity prices and logjams in the supply chain," Concepcion said.

"Unless we finish all the vaccines in stock and booster everybody that needs it, we risk going back to square one by yearend," he added.