COVID-19 case surge unlikely with 70% of public vaccinated —expert

A vaccine expert on Friday expressed confidence that a fresh surge in COVID-19 cases will be unlikely to happen once 70% of the Philippine population has been vaccinated against the respiratory illness.

Dr. Rontgene Solante of the Vaccine Expert Panel explained that countries reliant on vaccines with a lower efficacy, such as Chinese-made brand, will need to inoculate a bigger percentage of their population to ensure protection against COVID-19.

For the Philippines, however, Solante said vaccinating 70% of the population should be enough since the country employs a variety of COVID-19 vaccine brands composed of Pfizer, AstraZeneca, Sputnik V, and Sinovac.

“Since 'di naman tayo purely Sinovac lang, marami rin tayong other platform, I would say mataas ang kumpiyansa ko na we don’t suffer or we don’t have surge of cases pag nabakunahan na almost 70% of the population,” he said in a health department forum.

(Since we don’t just use Sinovac, we also use other vaccine platforms, I would say I have high confidence that we won’t suffer or have a surge of cases once 70% of the population has been vaccinated.)

Solante also said reports of surges in countries where the majority of the population received a Chinese vaccine need further study.

“Pwede kasing dumadami lang ang kaso pero wala namang namatay"(It’s possible that cases surged but no one died or developed severe infection,” he said.

He added: “It’s still acceptable kasi ‘yun naman yung purpose ng bakuna, basta hindi ka lang ma-admit (since the purpose of a vaccine is to prevent hospital admission). And that’s the essence why, even after you’re fully vaccinated... we still need to follow the minimum health protocols.”

The Philippines has vaccinated 6.2 million individuals as of June 20, still far from its target of inoculating 50 to 70 million people out of its 110-million population this year. —LBG, GMA News