Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, March 13) — A medical society appealed to the Philippine government on Saturday to not neglect doctors who are not affiliated with any hospital or organization in the COVID-19 vaccine distribution.
Dr. Oscar Tinio of the Philippine Medical Association expressed worries over the fact that other doctors are not included in the government’s master list for COVID-19 vaccination, and that they may be left behind since the focus is on medical frontliners working for government-run hospitals.
“Ang aming pagkakaalam ay ‘yung pong mga (medical) frontliners sa government ay inuuna, followed by tertiary, secondary and primary level hospitals,” he told CNN Philippines’ Newsroom Weekend.
[Translation: As far as we know, the (medical) frontliners in the government are given priority, followed by tertiary, secondary and primary level hospitals.]
“Kami ay umaapela sa pamahalaan na bigyan ng atensiyon ang ating mga doktor na nanggaling sa ganitong mga lugar (hindi kasama sa mga ospital sa listahan),” he added.
[Translation: We appeal to the government to pay attention to our doctors who come from such areas (not included in the hospitals on the list).]
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In a statement on Saturday, the Department of Health and the National Task Force Against COVID-19 assured the public that the country’s vaccination pace for medical frontliners would “rise exponentially”.
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The government’s bullishness is driven by expectations that the bulk of its procured COVID-19 vaccine doses, including those donations from the COVAX Facility, will arrive by “mid-second quarter of this year.”
“We are only in the second week of our rollout, but the experience we are gaining from this phase will help us once supply of vaccines becomes steady. As of latest count, we have already deployed almost 90% of our available doses,” NTF chief implementer and vaccine czar secretary Carlito G. Galvez was quoted as saying in the statement.
“We are confident that we will be vaccinating much more once our vaccines arrive, but while we wait for our turn to get vaccinated, I want to emphasize that we cannot let our guards down. Vaccination is only one of our strategies to beat this virus, but our adherence to MPHS is still the best,” Health chief Francisco Duque also said in the statement.
He did not provide figures on how many doctors have no direct link to the COVID-19 vaccination drive.
However, Dr. Tinio noted that the government may tap PMA’s 119 component societies to trace and add those doctors in the master list.
