LGU officials move up as ‘essential’ workers vax priority list

MANILA – Officials of local government units (LGU) have moved up as “essential” front-liners in the government’s vaccine priority list, Malacañang said Monday.

Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said LGU officials will be part of the “A4” priority with other frontline personnel in essential sectors including uniformed personnel and those in working sectors.

“A4 po ata ha, but I could be wrong, pero kasama na sila sa A priority (I think they belong to A4, but I could be wrong, but they are part of the A priority),” Roque said in a virtual presser.

Roque added that other government officials, such as Cabinet members, remain under the “B2” category.

“Well, I think not all government officials will have priority. In fact, doon kami sa ‘B’, matapos iyong unang priority (we’re part of the ‘B’ category, after the first priority),” he said.

He also clarified that not all government officials will be included in the government’s priority list.

“There will be priority for government workers ‘no. Pero sa ngayon po, hindi pa po kasama ang lahat (But for now, not everyone will be included),” he said.

There are currently around 1,634 provincial governors and city and municipal mayors and 42,046 barangay chairpersons all over the country.

Roque said more government officials and workers have contracted Covid-19.

He expressed hope that the interim National Immunization Technical Advisory Group (iNITAG) would consider studying the inclusion of other government officials on the priority list.

“Pinag-aaralan naman po siguro iyan ng ating mga miyembro ng NITAG kasi mayroon talagang mga taong front-liners within government service na hindi ‘health’ at kasama po iyong opisina namin ‘no dahil (It’s possible that the NITAG is already looking into this because there are front-liners within government service not health workers but part of our office because) we provide information at this critical time of a pandemic,” he added.

For its initial vaccination rollout, the government is using donated vaccines from Chinese drugmaker Sinovac and COVAX facility, the World Health Organization’s (WHO) global vaccine sharing scheme.

The country kicked off its vaccination for frontline healthcare workers on March 1.

The bulk of vaccine doses are expected to arrive by the second quarter of the year.