Galvez: 80% of COVID-19 vaccines worldwide already bought by rich countries

Rich countries already have the lion's share of the COVID-19 vaccine global supply, the Philippines' vaccine czar, Secretary Carlito Galvez, told a Senate hearing on Monday.

"The reality is that more than 80% of global supply has already been procured by rich countries. We, along with other countries, are now trying our best to negotiate with different vaccine companies to get a fair share of the vaccines for the remaining 18% of the global supply," Galvez told senators in a Senate inquiry on the government's vaccination plan.

Galvez reiterated that the country targets to inoculate 50 to 70 million Filipinos against COVID-19 this year and is now negotiating with seven to eight vaccine makers to purchase as much as 148 million doses.

"The best case scenario will be depending on the supply and demand of the vaccine. If we can achieve the early deployments of these vaccine by the first semester, we might be able to help more or less 50 to 70 [million]. But because of the restrictions on the supply chain... we might be having some sort of shortfall maybe on the second or first quarter of 2022," Galvez said.

The vaccine czar, who is also the National Task Force Against COVID-19 chief implementer, stressed that the vaccine supply in the global market is very "volatile" and assured the public that if there are opportunities to procure more in the soonest possible time, the government will grab the chance.

During the same hearing, Galvez said that the main volume of the COVID-19 vaccines that will be made available in the Philippines is the one developed by US firm Novavax. —KBK, GMA News