President Rodrigo Roa Duterte approved the vaccination of the general population and children aged 12-17 years old against COVID-19, Malacañang announced Tuesday, September 28.
The country’s general population or those who do not belong in any of the vaccination priority groups that were previously approved to be firsts in getting jabbed, will now have an opportunity to get vaccinated as well, Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque Jr. said in a press briefing.
He said because of a big supply of vaccines expected to be delivered in October, the President has decided that the vaccination program can now be expanded to the general population and children.
On pediatric vaccination or the vaccination of children ages 12-17 years old, Roque said parents are encouraged to have their children listed first in preparation for their vaccination in October.
The Palace official assured though that while the general population and children will be added to those who can get jabbed with a COVID-19 vaccine, those who belong to Priority Groups A1 to A3 will not lose their prioritization.
The country expects to receive some 27.2-million vaccine doses this month alone, including the delivery on September 29 of 391,950 doses of the Pfizer vaccines that were purchase by the national government.
Meanwhile, as of September 27 data from the National COVID-19 Vaccination Dashboard, a total of 44,361,285 vaccine doses have been administered nationwide, of which 20,583,580 or 26.68 percent are fully vaccinated.*