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Mandatory COVID-19 vaccination? Duterte has no position yet —Palace

By LLANESCA T. PANTI,GMA News

President Rodrigo Duterte has yet to come up with a position on a lawmaker's proposal to make COVID-19 vaccination mandatory, presidential spokesperson Harry Roque said Monday.

In his House Bill No. 9252, Dasmariñas Representative Elpidio Barzaga Jr. is proposing to make mandatory the inoculation of individuals against COVID-19 except those with medical conditions as determined by the Department of Health (DOH) or a licensed medical doctor.

Asked about Duterte's stand on this during a Palace briefing, Roque said: “The President does not have a position on this yet because we are seeing increased vaccine confidence but we don’t have enough COVID-19 vaccine supply yet.” 

“Gayunpaman, bilang abogado, kabahagi po ito ng police power ng estado na i-require ang bakuna kung talagang kinakailangan. It is not out of the question. Pero sa ngayon, hindi pa kinakailangang mandatory,” he added.

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(But as a lawyer, I would say that requiring the public to get vaccinated is part of the state's exercise of police power if there is really a need for such. But for now, there is no need for such measure.)

Roque said the decision on making getting COVID-19 jab mandatory could be better made once the country has enough vaccine supply.

The Philippines has 3,525,600 doses of COVID-19 vaccine supply so far. Of this number, three million came from Chinese firm Sinovac and are either donated by Beijing or bought by the Philippine government. The rest, made by British brand AstraZeneca, were donations from COVAX facility.

Both Sinovac and AstraZeneca are given in two doses, meaning such supply is only good for at least 1.7 million Filipinos.  —KBK, GMA News