COVID-19 vaccinations for kids aged 5-11 to start by first week of Feb
COVID-19 vaccinations for minors aged 5 to 11 are set to commence by Feb 4.
The inoculations will begin in the NCR with a targeted nationwide rollout by the middle of February, per National Task Force Against COVID-19 (NTF) advisor, Dr. Ted Herbosa.
The first batch comprised of 780,000 doses is set to arrive in Manila on Jan. 31. The government is planning to allocate some 15 million for the 5-11 age group.
During the Jan. 24 Talk To The People address of President Duterte, vaccine czar Galvez also said that the memorandum guidelines and Department of Health (DOH) training will be done within the week.
"Darating po next week ang mga supply, at pwede na po tayong mag-rollout by Feb. 4, next Friday," Galvez said.
The pediatric formulation of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine will also require two doses to be administered three weeks apart, but its dosage is lessened when compared to the jabs given to adults and teens.
“Iyong concentration din po noong vaccine ay mas mababa din po, kaysa doon sa ginagamit sa adults ngayon," said Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Director General Eric Domingo when the agency greenlit the vaccine for emergency use on December. "Iyon pong bakuna na ginagamit sa mga adults at saka sa 12 to 17, 12 pataas, ay hindi po iyon ang gagamitin sa mga bata."
Meanwhile, municipalities such as Taguig, Pateros, and Muntinlupa have already opened their COVID-19 vaccine preregistration for the younger age group.
As for children below five years old, Herbosa said that the FDA is still looking into data from China's recent move of inoculating children of the same age.
As of writing, the Philippines has fully inoculated a total of 57 million Filipinos, almost 53% of the country's 109 million population.