DOH: Gov’t using P368M in Bayanihan 2 funds to hire more vaccinators

The Department of Health (DOH) is using P368 million from the Bayanihan To Recover As One Law (Bayanihan 2) to hire more vaccinators for the government’s COVID-19 mass inoculation program.

“We have Bayanihan 2 funds valid until June 2021 and this is P368 million which we have given to our regional offices to hire COVID-19 vaccinators and this is up to June 31, 2021, but we are requesting the extension of Bayanihan 2,” Health Undersecretary Myrna Cabotaje said in a joint hearing of the House Committees on Health and Trade and Industry.

So far, Cabotaje said the DOH has already 3,000 vaccinators hired, adding that they are proposing to include the same provision in the proposed Bayanihan 3 Law.

The Bayanihan 2 Law has P165.5 billion funds for the government's COVID-19 response.

Apart from the hiring of more vaccinators, the government is also mobilizing medical health workers assigned in the military and other government agencies.

The government cooperation with the private sector is also pushed to repurpose private businesses’ health workers for the inoculation of more Filipinos especially those in the workforce.

“They (private businesses) are also repurposing some of the health workers that they are not actively using so that they will not deprive the hospitals from health workers, ‘yung mga nasa clinics lang nila, nasa pharmacies. So we are complementing our efforts,” she said.

Vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. also assured the stakeholders in the private sector that the government can help them in inoculating their employees once the vaccines procured by the business sector arrives in June.

He mentioned the vaccine simulations within the National Capital Region Plus area where they observed that the inoculation of 120,000 persons per day is achievable.

The government is also working with private hospitals for the possibility of tapping the medical schools for nurses and doctors to augment the number of vaccinators in the country, Galvez said.

“We are preparing for this and we have six weeks to prepare so that in June, we can start massive inoculation. The private sector procurement will arrive in June,” Galvez said.

Based on the prioritization list set by the national government, the vaccination rollout in the country will start with frontline health workers, followed by indigent senior citizens, persons with comorbidities, remaining senior citizens, remaining indigent population, and uniformed personnel. — RSJ, GMA News