WITH the Davao City Government currently on its vaccine procurement stage, Damosa Land Inc. (DLI) expressed willingness to have their Anflo Industrial Estate (AIE) cold storage facility be used for vaccine storage.
During the AIE 2021 Virtual Kickoff Friday, January 29, DLI first vice president Ricardo Lagdameo said that by April this year, they would have completed their 1,000 square meters Cold Storage Facility at the AIE in Panabo City, Davao del Norte.
He added the facility has a 600 pallet capacity available for lease. This is ideal for food processing, fresh produce, and meat and other food products storage.
Lagdameo, however, said that they are open to partner with the local government for use of this facility for vaccine storage.
"We are open to having vaccines stored here. In fact we like to have the word out that in two to three months time, the facility will be complete. I understand that many cold storage facilities are full so if there's a need to store vaccines, we would be happy to volunteer our facility," said Lagdameo, who added that their facility can go as cold as minus 25 degrees Celsius.
Davao City Covid-19 focal person Dr. Ashley Lopez, in a previous report, said the AstraZeneca vaccines are expected to arrive in Davao City by the third quarter of this year.
Aside from AstraZeneca, Lopez also revealed that the City Government is in talks with Janssen pharmaceuticals for the possible procurement of their Ad26.COV2.S vaccine. It is also expected to arrive in the third quarter of the year.
In different reports from the World Health Organization (WHO) and other international news organizations, Astrazeneca and Janssen are among the available vaccines that have low-temperature requirements at 2 to 8 degrees Celsius only.
Meanwhile, Pfizer BioNTech, which the city will be receiving from the National Government, requires cold storage facilities to have minus 70 to minus 75 degrees Celsius temperature capacity.
Currently, the City Government and Department of Health (DOH) Davao Region have yet to find a cold storage facility that can meet Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine's temperature requirement. The National Government has begun negotiations with logistics companies including Zuellig Pharma Corporation which has a branch in Davao City.
Meanwhile, Lopez said all applications to be official cold storage facilities for vaccines must be coursed through DOH Davao Region.