City Hall says it has enough vaccine supply

By Joseph B.A. Marzan

Iloilo City Mayor Jerry Treñas reiterated the city government’s encouragement of people to get vaccinated against the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), saying that it has enough supply of the vaccine.

City Health Office data on Sept. 12 showed that 5,023 persons were vaccinated against COVID, with 3,655 fully vaccinated and 1,468 receiving their first dose.

5,017 were vaccinated at “mega sites” (Robinsons Jaro, SM City Iloilo, Iloilo Convention Center, University of San Agustin, Festive Mall, and Central Philippine University), while 106 received jabs at community-based vaccination at Brgy. East Timawa in Molo district.

On Monday (Sept. 13), the city also vaccinated 10,972 persons, composed of 10,841 in its “mega sites”, and 131 in community-based vaccination at Brgy. Dungon C in Mandurriao district.

Treñas said that the city still has a “good” supply of COVID vaccines, having received 35,000 doses of Sinovac and 15,000 doses of Pfizer from the national government over the weekend.

The city is also set to receive this week another 50,000 doses of vaccines, according to the Department of Health-Western Visayas Center for Health Development (DOH-WV CHD) on Monday.

It also expects 28,000 AstraZeneca doses which is part of the 600,000 doses it acquired for P300 million.

The city government has repeatedly said that it aims to vaccinate 50 percent of its target population (525,000) by end of September or October.

Treñas also said that the city government has moved its herd immunity target to 90 percent, citing DOH data attributed to the COVID Delta (B.1.617.2) variant.

“The DOH’s new data states that now that there is the Delta variant, [the target] is no longer 85 percent, but already 90 percent. So, it is a moving target. We’ll try to do as much as we can. But we are sure we can reach 50 percent, at most, by the 1st week of October,” Treñas said.

In a press release, the city government also stated that the City Epidemiology Surveillance Unit (CESU) has recorded a downtrend of COVID deaths.

CESU data indicated that there have been 40 COVID deaths in May and 90 in June, but has gone down to 69 in July and 60 in August. There have also been 21 deaths recorded between Sept. 1 to 11.

VAXX FOR BAR TAKERS

University of San Agustin College of Law (USA-COL) Dean and Daily Guardian columnist Atty. Jose Mari Benjamin Francisco Tirol welcomed Treñas’ request for law graduates taking the Bar Examinations in November 2021 to get vaccinated.

In a press release, the mayor said that the city was open to vaccinating Bar exam takers from all over the country.

“I am requesting all Bar examinees to be vaccinated in preparation for the examinations. Iloilo City vaccination centers will accept all graduates of law schools all over the country so that they can be fully vaccinated prior to the Bar,” said Treñas.

Central Philippine University (CPU) in Jaro district is one of two sites in Western Visayas for the exams, the other being the University of St. La Salle in Bacolod City.

There are only 475 slots for examinees at CPU, and USA-COL has about 153 Bar examinees including around 20 retakers according to the Dean.

Tirol said they join the mayor’s call to vaccinate everyone against COVID-19.

“We join the call of Mayor Treñas for everyone, not only bar examinees, to be vaccinated against COVID-19,” he said in a statement.