BY WENDELL VIGILIA and GERARD NAVAL
A BILL seeking to make vaccination against COVID-19 mandatory was filed at the House yesterday.
Rep. Elpidio Barzaga Jr. (NUP, Cavite), in House Bill No. 9252, said a mandatory, “mass” COVID-19 vaccination program is needed to address the pandemic and achieve “herd immunity” or “population immunity.”
But Health Secretary Maria Rosario Vergeire opposed the measure, saying Filipinos must decide for themselves.
“We adhere to the WHO (World Health Organization) and SAGE (Strategic Advisory Group of Experts) recommendations that this should be purely voluntary. It is the right of a person to decide if he shall receive or will not receive the vaccine,” she said.
“At this stage or this period of the case, where the vaccines are still at developmental stage, we cannot mandate people to accept this vaccine because this is still not really completed yet,” she also said.
Vergeire said the health department agrees with the intention of the measure as it is seeks to protect as many Filipinos as possible.
“There is what we call moral obligation to be vaccinated, wherein we don’t consider only ourselves but the whole community or population because we want to achieve herd immunity,” she said.
The government targets to vaccinate some 50 million to 70 million Filipinos as part of efforts to achieve herd immunity. The country has received some 3.025 million doses since February.
Epidemiologist Dr. John Wong, in a briefing, said the Philippines needs to vaccinate at least 350,000 people daily to reach herd immunity by February 2022. But with current vaccination rate, reaching herd immunity by February next year would be delayed.
Current vaccination level is around 46,000 per day.
Vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. said as of April 25, some 1.74 million people have been vaccinated, with 1.508 million receiving the first dose and 230,998 completing the two doses.
Vergeire said before herd immunity, the government is looking at attaining “herd containment” in the National Capital Region (Metro Manila) which has been the epicenter of the pandemic in the Philippines for months now.
Vergeire said “herd containment” refers to being able to concentrate the immunization program in areas with high level of transmission.
“The main objective is to do containment or herd containment in a specific area, where there are a lot of cases,” she said.
“Our experts are recommending that we focus our vaccination on the specific areas so that it can help reduce the number of cases and break the chain of transmission,” she said.
She said Metro Manila and nearby provinces would be the logical target for the scheme, given the large concentration of cases in the area.
“When we look at the data, 50 percent of all of the cases of COVID-19 are all in NCR Plus area,” she said referring to Metro Manila and the provinces of Bulacan, Cavite, Laguna and Rizal.
“These strategies are being discussed right now but will be depending on supplies agreement and discussions that are ongoing,” she said.
HB 9252 makes vaccination mandatory for persons who are eligible to get the COVID-19 vaccine, as determined by the Department of Health. It seeks to amend Republic Act No. 11525 or “An Act Establishing the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) Vaccination Program Expediting the Vaccine Procurement and Administration Process, Providing Funds Therefor, And For Other Purposes.”
Under the bill, “no persons who are covered by this Act, as determined by the DOH, shall be allowed to enter, convene or occupy public places, whether or not government or privately owned.”
Persons with medical conditions as determined by the DOH or by a licensed medical doctor shall be exempted from the inoculation of COVID-1 vaccine, the bill said.
“In order to safely achieve herd immunity against COVID-19, a substantial proportion of a population would need to be vaccinated. This would lower the overall amount of virus able to spread in the whole population. One of the aims with working towards herd immunity is to keep vulnerable groups who cannot get vaccinated especially those who due to health conditions become safe and protected from the COVID-19 virus,” Barzaga said.
The measure said even the World Health Organization (WHO) supports achieving herd immunity through vaccination because it would stop the disease from spreading “through any segment of the population that would result in unnecessary cases and deaths.”
While the bill acknowledges there is still no science or data available as to the percentage of people who need to be vaccinated to achieve herd immunity, it said there appears to be a progression towards herd immunity in some parts of United States particularly in New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts and Connecticut.
Barzaga said that on top of passing the bill, the government also needs to “increase vaccine confidence and improve the public’s understanding of how it can help control the spread of COVID-19 in their families and communities through a mass information campaign using print, radio, TV and social media.”
Deputy speaker Eddie Villanueva (PL, Cibac) and some fellow House leaders filed a bill seeking to penalize with imprisonment government negligence and lapses in responding to the COVID-19 crisis.
Villanueva filed House Bill 9230 or the “Public Health Emergency Anti-Negligent and Corrupt Practices Act” which is also authored by deputy speakers Bienvenido Abante Jr. (Manila), Bernadette Herrera-Dy (PL, Bagong Henerasyon), Michael Romero (PL, 1Pacman), among others.
The bill provides stiffer penalties for certain graft and corrupt practices committed during a state of public health emergency.
“We should not only penalize acts of corruption, bribery or plunder; we must also deplore and punish inaction and acts that are manifest and imbued with intolerable negligence, irresponsibility, inefficiency and lack of vision especially during times of crisis such as this COVID-19 pandemic. Public officers and employees should neither be corrupt nor negligent.
Or else, the public will suffer a great deal of undeserving disservice,” said Villanueva.
Prohibited acts under HB 9230, which are punishable with imprisonment of five to 20 years, perpetual disqualification from public office, and confiscation or forfeiture in favor of the government of any prohibited interest and unexplained wealth, are:
– Negligence in crafting government response to a public health emergency; neglecting or refusing, after due demand or request, without sufficient justification, to act within a reasonable time on any matter pending before him/her relative to any issue on public health threat.
– Negligence in the performance of duty relative to securing needed medicines, vaccines, supplies or facilities necessary in the containment or eradication of public health threat; delay or causing the delay in the disbursement of public funds intended for public health emergency response of the government;
– Failure to submit a certified report, within the time allowed, on disbursements made by a government agency or local government unit pursuant to a specific government response program or project.
– Tampering or non-disclosure of full and complete epidemiological data with the purpose of downplaying the real situation of the state of public health emergency.
– Gross violation of standard health protocols promulgated by the government.
– Entering, on behalf of the government, into any contract or transaction manifestly and grossly disadvantageous to the same, whether or not the public officer profited or will profit thereby; and other similar or analogous acts, provided that these acts were committed in the course of or during a public health emergency. — With Jocelyn Montemayor
