Health Secretary Francisco Duque on Thursday said Metro Manila is “ripe” for deescalation to Alert Level 1 since it has vaccinated over 80% of eligible senior citizens. However, he did not give details on the vaccination rate of those with comorbidities.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 24) — The Philippine College of Physicians (PCP) on Thursday said Metro Manila is not yet ready to downgrade to Alert Level 1 considering the low vaccination and booster shot rate of two vulnerable sectors.
Dr. Maricar Limpin, president of PCP, said that while daily COVID-19 cases and healthcare utilization continue to go down in the capital region, Metro Manila has not yet vaccinated 80% of the elderly and people with comorbidities — one of the requirements of the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF).
She added that the rate of administered booster doses should be up to par with the vaccination rate.
“The elderly as well as those with comorbid condition should have received both the primary vaccine, as well as the booster dose,” she told CNN Philippines.
“It cannot be just the primary vaccine because if it’s just the primary vaccine then we expect already that their immunity has already gone down and therefore increased likelihood of getting infection and getting severe disease,” Limpin also said.
“We need to ramp up the vaccination campaign before we really start looking into downgrading our alert level system,” she added.
Metro Manila mayors unanimously recommended to the IATF to downgrade the region to Alert Level 1 or the “new normal” without restrictions in business and transport capacity starting March 1.
However, the IATF has also made it clear that a local government or a region should have vaccinated 80% of the eligible senior citizens and people with comorbidities before the lowest alert level can be considered.
The government has yet to vaccinate around 3 million from these sectors nationwide.
To date, the country has fully vaccinated 60 million citizens, but the booster rate is still at a dismal 8 million.
