Rodrigo Duterte repea­ted­ly announced that vaccination will be his regime’s primary strategy in addressing the Covid-19 pandemic. Over and over, he boasts of his plan to vaccinate 75% to 80% of the total population in the Philippines. However, his regime has no efficient plan to procure, store and distribute vaccines. He admitted that the government still has no funds and that it will primarily rely on the private sector for the procurement of the required doses.

Since November, vaccine “czar” Gen. Car­li­to Galvez has been announcing plans to order from big pharmaceutical companies. He repeatedly promised that vaccines will arrive in the Philippines in the first or second quarter of 2021.

This promise is false because firstly, the trials for most of the vaccines are not yet done, and secondly, big companies will only earmark limited stocks for small counties such as the Philippines. As of now, Duterte has only gone as far as allowing the use of vaccines for emer­­gency-use beginning Ja­nua­ry 2021.

The regime is also touting about its to buy 50 million doses of vaccines from Si­novac (Chi­na) and 2.6 million doses from AstraZe­neca (UK). The said companies are yet to receive permits to conduct clinical trials in the country.