10% of target population vaccinated vs. Covid-19

MANILA – About 10 percent of the target population for the country to achieve population protection have already been inoculated against coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19), a health official said Monday.

“So, kapag kinompute mo sa 70 percent ng populasyon, nasa 9.8 percent na tayo na (if you compute at 70 percent of the population, we’re at 9.8 percent) vaccinated individuals, fully-vaccinated,” Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said in an online media forum.

The Philippine government’s goal is to inoculate up to 70 million this year to achieve population protection.

“Kay (Health) Usec. (Leopoldo) Vega, nung nagsalita siya sa media, ang nagamit na denominator (When Usec. Leopoldo Vega spoke to the media, the denominator used is the entire population of the Philippines which is about 110 million, that’s why the computation was) 2 percent,” she added.

In relation, Vergeire stressed the importance of careful data interpretation and the use of key indicators such as target population in checking the government’s progress in its vaccination activities.

“We still have a long way to go, and we really need to ramp up our vaccination efforts and hopefully our supplies will stabilize para mas bumilis at mas maka-achieve tayo nitong (so vaccination would be faster, and we could achieve these) fully-vaccinated individuals,” she added.

Earlier, the Department of Health defined fully-vaccinated individuals as people who already received two doses of vaccines against Covid-19.

In a Palace briefing on Monday, Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said 1,855,472 individuals have completed their Covid-19 vaccination.

Of these, 964,781 are healthcare front-liners; 471,425 are senior citizens; 412,246 are persons with comorbidity; and 7,020 are economic front-liners.