Public told to wait for schedule to prevent crowding at vaccination centers
MANILA, Philippines — The Department of Health urged the public on Tuesday to wait for their turn to get vaccinated and follow the protocols set by the government to keep the country's inoculation drive organized.
DOH National Capital Region Director Gloria Balboa issued this reminder after residents flocked to a mall in Parañaque City on Monday, hoping to get vaccinated with the Pfizer-BioNTech jab.
Thousands of individuals also lined up at a hotel in the City of Manila on Tuesday. But only 900 Pfizer vaccine doses were allotted for the nation’s capital
“What happened there was even those who were not scheduled to get vaccinated went to the venue,” Balboa said in Filipino, referring to the incident in Parañaque.
She asked the public to secure an appointment first and wait for their schedule before heading to vaccination sites.
“It gets more disorderly when there are walk-ins. Usually, the number of walk-ins exceeds those who are scheduled to get inoculated. So it would be really better to follow the schedule,” Balboa said.
The DOH-NCR director also called on local government units to properly disseminate vaccination protocols to their constituents.
“I hope it does not happen again. We need to improve our communication with the public that they really need to wait for their schedule for vaccination,” she said.
Since the Philippine launched its vaccination campaign on March 1, only 719,602 have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19. Meanwhile, 2.28 million have received the first of two doses of the vaccine. — Gaea Katreena Cabico with report from News5/Justine Punzalan
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