COVID inoculations in province tagged to city

By Joseph B.A. Marzan

The high coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccination rates in Iloilo City may be due to recipients from other areas of Western Visayas and the country, officials from both the city and province of Iloilo admitted on Thursday.

Iloilo City Mayor Jerry Treñas told Daily Guardian via Viber that the city’s COVID vaccination data was not segregated as to the origin or actual address of the beneficiaries.

The city opened its vaccination efforts to non-resident workers and even other non-residents in general, including minors aged 12 to 17 years old.

COVID vaccination data from the Department of Health-Western Visayas Center for Health Development (DOH-WV CHD) indicated that as of 3 a.m. of Nov. 11, a total of 318,525 persons, or 95.03 percent of Iloilo City’s target population (335,172), have been fully vaccinated.

Iloilo Provincial Health Office (IPHO) chief Dr. Ma. Socorro Quiñon said in a press conference on Thursday that they have written Treñas to retrieve the data for proper attribution.

Quiñon said that the non-attribution to other local government units was due to the lumping of all data by vaccination location by the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) central office.

She said it would be difficult for other local governments in the province to achieve their 70 percent target for herd immunity since many of their residents have chosen to get vaccinated in Iloilo City.

Based on IPHO data as of Nov. 10, fully-vaccinated persons in Iloilo province totaled 419,628, representing 29 percent of its 1.4 million target population.

“We would like to appreciate and thank the city of Iloilo for vaccinating our population. However, if you are vaccinated in [Iloilo City], the accomplishment is being tagged there. We are a bit concerned about that especially that the DOH has set targets for that, and many from neighboring towns like in Leganes, Oton, Pavia, and Santa Barbara are being vaccinated in the city, and we cannot reconcile that as of now,” Quiñon said.

MINOR VACCINATIONS

Quiñon said 4,262 minors aged 12 to 17 have received their first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, with 1,107 belonging to the Pediatric A3 group (minors with comorbidities).

The number also includes 290 minors from the province who were vaccinated at the West Visayas State University Medical Center (WVSU-MC).

She noted the eagerness of the minors to receive their vaccines, saying that the IPHO observed them as not being nervous.

“Our minors weren’t nervous. Maybe they were the ones who have been very well-educated, in the sense that they are not nervous of the side effects of the vaccines. They are even the ones who are more excited than their parents,” she remarked.

The provincial government’s target is around 227,659.