1.27M COVID-19 vaccine doses arrive in Philippines

The Philippines on Thursday received a total of 1,273,100 COVID-19 vaccine doses from pharmaceutical companies AstraZeneca and Pfizer.

An aircraft carrying 255,200 doses of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine procured by the private sector landed at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport Terminal 1 on Thursday morning.

Hours later, 1,017,900 Pfizer vaccine doses purchased by the government were delivered to the country.

The Philippines has so far received 151.4 million doses, according to National Task Force Against COVID-19 Assistant Secretary Wilben Mayor.

Meanwhile, United States Embassy economic counselor David Gamble lauded the Philippines for recording zero COVID-19 cases in some of its major hospitals.

"They've been telling me about their major hospitals and many of them have zero COVID patients in it and it just means that the Philippines is winning the fight against COVID-19," Gamble told reporters.

As of December 8, government data showed that the Philippines has over 39.5 million fully vaccinated citizens. — VBL, GMA News