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Coronavirus pandemic
This Week in AsiaHealth & Environment

Philippines set to roll out Sinovac Covid-19 jabs, but some businesses can’t wait

  • Although 600,000 Sinovac doses will be given starting next week, private firms throughout the country have secured their own vaccines
  • Hundreds of companies have bought millions of doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine and other jabs, aiming to get their employees rolling again

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A health worker in Metro Manila participates in a simulation for the Philippines’ Covid-19 vaccination drive. Photo: Reuters
Elyssa LopezandReuters
The Philippines will receive its first batch of Covid-19 vaccines this weekend from China’s Sinovac Biotech, allowing it to start its inoculation programme next week and lifting hopes for an economic revival after lengthy lockdowns that have fuelled job losses and substantially cut consumer spending.
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Harry Roque, spokesman for President Rodrigo Duterte, said 600,000 doses of the Sinovac vaccine would arrive on Sunday out of the 25 million doses that have been ordered, while 10,000 doses of a vaccine developed by China’s Sinopharm are also expected to arrive soon under a “compassionate use” license for Duterte’s security detail. Doses from AstraZeneca will arrive in March, Roque said.
Despite having among the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in Asia, the Philippines will be the last Southeast Asian country to receive its initial set of vaccines. Pfizer and AstraZeneca, the two Western pharmaceutical firms whose vaccines have received approval from Manila’s health authorities, had asked for an indemnity clause to be inserted into purchase agreements for their vaccines.

They were worried about suffering the same fate as the French drug maker Sanofi, which is facing lawsuits in the Philippines after an inoculation campaign involving its dengue drug, Dengvaxia, allegedly resulted in the deaths of several children dating as far back as 2016.

Earlier this week, the Philippine Congress approved a law protecting drug companies that make the Covid-19 vaccines from most lawsuits, opening the way for the AstraZeneca doses. There has been no word on when the Pfizer vaccines might come.

While Manila is expected to provide more details on how it will prioritise its citizens for vaccination, an initial plan showed that health care workers would be the first to get the shots and that those aged 18 and above and employed in non-essential industries would be last on the list.

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But with the Philippine Food and Drug Authority (FDA) saying the Sinovac vaccine was not suitable for health care workers – efficacy data found it was 50.6 per cent effective in preventing Covid-19 in a trial involving health care workers in Brazil, but 91 per cent effective in a much smaller trial conducted in Turkey – Roque said the Sinovac doses may instead be given to military personnel and workers in the transport, agriculture, fishing and export-oriented industries.

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