Philippines reaches 54M fully vaccinated persons almost 2 weeks into 2022

More than 54 million of the Philippine population have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19 amid the sudden steep increase in cases which started after Christmas, the National Task Force Against COVID-19 said on Friday.

Data from the National Vaccination Operations Center (NVOC) as of January 13 showed that 54,457,863 individuals have been fully vaccinated or 70.60% of the government's target for vaccination.

The Philippines, thus, reached less than a week into 2022 the milestone vaccine czar Secretary Carlito Galvez said the government wanted to reach by the end of 2021.

“Malaki ang naging epekto ng Bagyong Odette sa ating pagbabakuna kaya bahagyang naantala ang pag-abot sa target nating 54 million fully vaccinated individuals sa pagtatapos ng 2021,"Galvez said in a statement.

"Sinabayan pa ito ng panibagong surge ngayong Enero, pero hindi tayo tumigil sa pagbabakuna,” he added.

[Typhoon Odette had a big impact on our vaccination rollout so it slightly delayed our target of having 54 million fully vaccinated individuals by the end of 2021. Then came another surge this January, but we did not stop vaccinating.]

NVOC figures showed that a total of 117,383,756 vaccine doses had been administered nationwide as of Thursday.

Galvez said the country’s average vaccination rate still reached 1.04 million a day over the past three days despite logistical limitations and the ongoing surge of COVID-19 infections.

The vaccine czar said that six regions in the country had already surpassed the 70% mark in terms of fully vaccinated individuals.

These are Metro Manila with 109.07%, Cordillera Administrative Region with 78.43%, Ilocos Region with 78.17%, Cagayan Valley with 74.93%, Central Luzon with 75.74%, and CALABARZON 71.92%.

“This current Omicron surge will target the unvaccinated. Sa lahat ng ating mga LGU (local government units), gawin natin ang lahat ng ating makakaya para mahikayat ang ating mga mamamayan na magpabakuna na para makaiwas sa severe cases, pagkaospital o pagkamatay,” Galvez said.

[This current Omicron surge will target the unvaccinated. In all our LGUs, let us do all we can to encourage our citizens to get vaccinated to avoid severe cases, hospitalization or death.]

“Let us prioritize the unvaccinated individuals who belong to the vulnerable sectors, while also ramping up the administration of booster shots for eligible individuals,” he added.

A total of 4,415,333 individuals have already received their booster or additional doses as of January 14, Friday.

The country has already received 213,655,520 doses of COVID-19 vaccines from various manufacturers.

The Department of Health on Friday logged 37,207 new COVID-19 cases, another record high since the start of pandemic. This increased the nationwide count to 3,129,512.

The previous highest daily case count reported was 34,021 only the day before on  Thursday. —NB, GMA News