Mayor Edgardo Labella on Thursday said he has officially asked the country’s vaccine czar, Secretary Carlito Galvez Jr., to supply Cebu City with additional doses of coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) vaccines.

“As soon as I read the news that vaccine czar ,Secretary Carlito Galvez Jr., has reported to President Rodrigo Duterte regarding the arrival of additional 500,000 doses of Sinovac vaccine, I immediately communicated with Secretary Galvez,” the mayor said in a mix of Cebuano and English via social media.

Labella said he requested that Cebu City “be given a fair share of these doses” as more and more senior citizens in the city are now willing to be inoculated, based on the city government’s online registration system, “and they are just waiting for these to arrive”.

He said some 150,000 doses of Russia-made Sputnik V vaccines are also expected to arrive in the country.

“Secretary Galvez has also assured that by June or July, other brands such as Moderna ug (and) Pfizer are also expected to arrive,” he said.

The mayor said the city government is trying to be prudent in spending the budget that it has allocated for the purchase of its own vaccines.

He said before the city government decides to buy its own vaccines, it will wait until the national government is done rolling out the free vaccines to the various local government units.

The inoculation of senior citizens in this city has temporarily been suspended due to shortage of vaccines.

As of Friday last week, the city had used 5,000 doses of China-made CoronaVac vaccines in inoculating its elderly residents.

The city is yet to receive a word from the Department of Health (DOH) when the next delivery would be.

As of April 22, at least 10,000 senior citizens in Cebu City have signified intent to be vaccinated against Covid-19 but only half has so far been inoculated out of the 19,000 targeted in an online registration.

The DOH in Central Visayas noted that for the whole region that includes the provinces of Cebu, Bohol, Siquijor and Negros Oriental, at least 572,626 senior citizens have registered for vaccination.

As of Friday last week, only 5,793 senior citizens in Central Visayas were vaccinated, or only 1.01 percent of the pre-listed elderlies in the region.

Photo Source: Facebook/Edgar Labella