MANILA – The Philippines has administered a total of 71,689,132 doses of coronavirus vaccines nationwide, with 32,212,344 Filipinos are now fully protected against the severe risks of the dreaded Covid-19 infection.
In a media interview on Wednesday, National Task Force (NTF) against Covid-19 chief implementer Secretary Carlito Galvez Jr. expressed confidence anew that the government will be able to fully inoculate "at least half" of the country's target population by end of the month.
He said the government's plan to push a three-day national vaccination drive, which will be done simultaneously across 17 regions from Nov. 29 to Dec. 1, will help the country "sustain or even increase" the current vaccination pace.
The government aims to increase the country's average daily vaccination rate of up to 1.5 million doses to soon achieve population protection by end of December.
Galvez reported the country's average daily doses administered in the last seven days have "significantly" improved to 854,108 jabs, compared to 748,839 doses in the previous week.
On Tuesday, some 1,002,361 doses were administered, a gradual rise from 274,105 on Sunday and 963,777 on Monday.
The Philippines received a total of 128,444,400 doses of Covid-19 vaccines, both government-procured and donations, from various pharmaceutical companies.
Galvez said there will be more vaccines that are slated to arrive until December.
“More than 16 million doses are still expected to arrive this November, which means that by the end of this month, we would be receiving 140 million doses since February. These will be crucial as we carry out a more aggressive vaccination rollout nationwide,” he added. (PNA)