{"id":273065,"date":"2020-10-27T02:23:34","date_gmt":"2020-10-27T06:23:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=273065"},"modified":"2020-10-27T02:23:34","modified_gmt":"2020-10-27T06:23:34","slug":"prrd-prefers-govt-to-govt-deal-for-covid-19-vaccine-purchase","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2020\/10\/27\/prrd-prefers-govt-to-govt-deal-for-covid-19-vaccine-purchase\/","title":{"rendered":"PRRD prefers gov’t-to-gov’t deal for Covid-19 vaccine purchase"},"content":{"rendered":"
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He said he was against purchasing vaccines from private pharmaceutical companies. (Anadolu photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

MANILA<\/strong>\u00a0\u2013 President Rodrigo Duterte on Tuesday said he would prefer a government-to-government agreement for the purchase of coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) vaccines, saying it would prevent the risk of corruption.<\/p>\n

In a pre-recorded speech, Duterte asked Health Secretary Francisco Duque III to ensure that the country\u2019s negotiating team would ensure a government-to-government transaction.<\/p>\n

“Maganda sana<\/em>\u00a0(It’s good if it’s a) government-to-government\u00a0ang<\/em>\u00a0transaction.\u00a0Walang<\/em>\u00a0corruption,\u00a0wala lahat kasi<\/em>\u00a0(there’s no corruption because it’s) government-to-government. I\u2019m offering it to China\u00a0kasi mayroon na sila<\/em>\u00a0(because they already have it),” he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo the Chinese government and to the people who are really parlaying the vaccine, we — you need not look for partners. We can make it government-to-government and I will pay you,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

He said he was against purchasing vaccines from private pharmaceutical companies.<\/p>\n

\u201cI hate\u00a0\u2018yang ano — ayaw ko \u2018yung<\/em>\u00a0(I don\u2019t like) private persons,\u00a0magbili tayo sa<\/em>\u00a0(if we buy from) private Chinese businessmen,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He did not specify which Chinese firm he was referring to, but Sinopharm, a Chinese state-owned company, recently canceled plans to hold clinical trials in the country.<\/p>\n

Last week, China\u2019s Sinovac Biotech has submitted to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Philippines its application to conduct Phase 3 of clinical trials of its vaccine in the country.<\/p>\n

Sinovac may start late-stage trials of its vaccine in the country as early as next month.<\/p>\n

Aside from China, the government is also evaluating vaccines of Russia\u2019s Gamaleya Research Institute, and other pharmaceutical companies.<\/p>\n

Earlier, Duterte said he would ask for a discount from China and Russia on the vaccines that each of the two countries have developed, hopeful that their leaders would understand his plight amid the global recession.<\/p>\n

\u201cI will ask the — my friend (Russian) President (Vladimir) Putin and (Chinese) President Xi Jinping to give us a credit,\u00a0parang utang<\/em>\u00a0(like a loan), a credit line but we will pay not in one payment but by installments.\u00a0Basta ang sinasabi ko magbayad tayo. Hindi ito libr<\/em>e (I\u2019m just saying that we\u2019ll pay for it. It\u2019s not free),\u201d Duterte said.<\/p>\n

Malaca\u00f1ang earlier assured of the vaccine\u2019s affordability.<\/p>\n

Duterte said that vaccination fees of the poor, police, military, and front-liners would be shouldered by the government.<\/p>\n

The government initially allotted PHP20 billion to buy 40 million doses for 20 million Filipinos.<\/p>\n

As of Oct. 26, there are 371,630 confirmed Covid-19 cases in the country, including 7,039 deaths and 328,258 recoveries.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MANILA\u00a0\u2013 President Rodrigo Duterte on Tuesday said he would prefer a government-to-government agreement for the purchase of coronavirus disease 2019 …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":271652,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,95],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-273065","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-news-ph","mauthors-azer-parrocha","mauthors-philippine-news-agency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/273065","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=273065"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/273065\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":273066,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/273065\/revisions\/273066"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/271652"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=273065"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=273065"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=273065"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}