San Juan City Mayor Francis Zamora announced on Thursday, Sept. 15, that the city continues to lead in the Covid-19 vaccination program of all local government units (LGUs) in the National Capital Region (NCR) as of Sept. 12.

According to the Department of Health's (DOH) Resbakuna data, San Juan City had already fully vaccinated 236,073 adults, equivalent to 243.35 percent.

A total of 10,574 individuals aged 5-11 years-old have also been vaccinated by the LGU against the virus. This is equivalent to 91.47 percent.

San Juan City also leads in the number of boosted adults against Covid-19 after inoculating 96,855 individuals with their first booster shot, equivalent to 101.07 percent.

"Tuloy tuloy lang po tayo sa pagbabakuna upang tuluyang mapuksa ang Covid-19. I-check ang schedule ng bakunahan sa inyong barangay o sa ating mga vaccination centers sa San Juan City Hall o sa VMall Greenhills (Our fight against Covid-19 will continue until we successfully eradicated this virus. Please check the schedule of vaccinations in your barangays or proceed to our vaccination centers located at the San Juan City Hall and VMall Greenhills)," Zamora said.

On Aug. 22, the city government opened satellite Covid-19 vaccination sites in all 13 public schools to ensure that residents are protected against the virus, especially with the detection of several more-transmissible Omicron subvariants in the country.

“San Juan City continues to vaccinate our population against Covid-19 to make sure our constituents are protected against the virus. We are now administering booster shots to qualified populations and will also give primary series to those who recently qualified, like our children,” Zamora said.

“The vaccination of children is not compulsory. However, we want to encourage the parents to have their kids vaccinated against Covid-19 so they are protected against the ill effects of the virus. To make sure the vaccine is accessible, we will set up satellite Covid-19 vaccination sites in all our public schools in the city,” he added.

On Aug. 15, Zamora underscored the importance of getting vaccinated and boosted against the virus.

“Well, we can see still that even fully vaccinated individuals get Covid, but what we should look at really is the severity of their condition. Let’s not focus just on the number of cases but let’s look at how many are severe, how many are critical, how many are mild to asymptomatic,” Zamora noted.

“Our hospital utilization rate is also low, where majority of Covid-19 patients in our hospitals are actually residents from other cities and provinces,” he added.

“We have gone to the extent of going house-to-house for our booster vaccination. In fact, I have acted as an ambassador for the vaccination program. I believe as mayor, it is my duty to push for a high vaccination rate. This is something we have achieved. We remain to be number one in terms of number of fully vaccinated individuals in relation to our target population and also in the administration of the first booster,” the mayor explained.

Aside from house-to-house vaccination, the city government had also set up vaccination sites in malls and other high volume commercial establishments to encourage people to get vaccinated and boosted.