Talisay City in need of more vaccine doses for seniors

FIRST JABS. Talisay City’s senior citizens await their turn to be vaccinated at the Lagtang Gym on Thursday, May 6, 2021. Netizen Jason Baguia complained that some senior citizens waiting for their Covid-19 jabs had to leave after they learned from vaccinators that only 50 doses of the vaccine were available for the day. / JASON BAGUIA
FIRST JABS. Talisay City’s senior citizens await their turn to be vaccinated at the Lagtang Gym on Thursday, May 6, 2021. Netizen Jason Baguia complained that some senior citizens waiting for their Covid-19 jabs had to leave after they learned from vaccinators that only 50 doses of the vaccine were available for the day. / JASON BAGUIA

TALISAY City Mayor Gerald Anthony “Samsam” Gullas Jr. is asking the Department of Health Central Visayas (DOH 7) to provide his city with more Covid-19 vaccine doses so that more of its senior citizens can be inoculated.

Gullas made the comment after a netizen said on Facebook that his father received his first dose of the Sinovac vaccine more than three hours after arriving at the vaccination site in Brgy. Lagtang on

Thursday morning, May 6, 2021, and that more seniors who registered to be vaccinated were refused on the same day due to lack of vaccine stocks.

Netizen and journalism professor Jason Baguia posted on his Facebook page that his father went to the Lagtang gym at 6 a.m. to get himself vaccinated.

Despite arriving early at the vaccination site, Baguia’s father waited until 9:13 a.m. before he got his Covid-19 jab.

His father was told that the processing for those who want to get jabbed would start at 8 a.m.

But even though some senior citizens went early to get themselves vaccinated, some of them, except Baguia’s father, went home after hearing that only 50 doses were available for the day.

Majority of those who went to the Lagtang gym, including Baguia’s father, were returnees or those who had gone to the gym the previous day to be vaccinated but been advised to return the next day because the vaccines had run out that day.

Only 40 doses were administered at the center the previous day, Baguia said.

Baguia said his father was vaccinated ahead of those who had registered before him that day, because he had had two surgeries on his spinal column and was limping.

Baguia asked the Talisay City government to improve its vaccine rollout to prevent more seniors from being turned away.

“There is a large room for improvement. Senior citizens, the elderly and frontline health workers should not have to suffer being turned away and asked to come back due to the shortage of vaccines. The whole process of vaccination should also be much faster. Otherwise, herd immunity will not be reached fast enough,” Baguia told SunStar Cebu.

Though he admits that Baguia’s concerns are a challenge in the city’s vaccination rollout, Gullas told reporters that one thing they need to address first is the available supply of Covid-19 vaccines being provided to their city.

Gullas admitted that the 350 doses they are using to vaccinate their senior citizens were given by the Cebu Provincial Health Office due to their status as a component city.

He added that they need more vaccines in order for their seniors to be fully vaccinated.

Gullas also appealed to the DOH to provide them with enough Covid-19 vaccine doses similar to other cities in the region.

“Personally, being the biggest city and local government unit in the Province, hopefully we can have more vaccines because we are ready to vaccinate and we don’t want to be overwhelmed with people who want to be vaccinated at a certain time,” Gullas said. (JKV)

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