A TOTAL of 1,285,833 individuals or 69.24 percent of the total population in Davao City has received their first dose of the Covid-19 vaccine as of January 28, said Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio.
“Less than one percent na lang, ma-hit na nato ang target na 70 percent of the population,” the mayor said during a radio segment interview on Monday, January 31.
(We only have less than one percent before we hit 70 percent of the population.)
At the same time, 1,237,182 Dabawenyos, or 66.62 percent of the total population, are fully vaccinated or those that have completed the second dose of their vaccination.
Duterte-Carpio said the benchmark in determining how many people have been vaccinated has changed.
Instead of the previous one to 100 percent of the targeted population, which is 70 percent of the whole population, the City Government will use the percentage of vaccinated persons out of the total population in Davao City.
“Ang gigamit nila na benchmark is ang 70 percent of the population because ang herd immunity is 70 percent of the total population,” said Duterte-Carpio, referring to the 1,299,894 persons initially targeted to be vaccinated at the start of the rollout in 2021.
(The benchmark they used is 70 percent of the population because that is what’s needed for herd immunity.)
Dr. Michelle Schlosser, spokesperson of Davao City Covid-19 Task Force, said on Wednesday, February 2, 2022, that they will go beyond the herd immunity target and vaccinate the whole population of approximately 1,856,000 Dabawenyos.
“Naa na ta sa 96 to 97 percent sa atong (We are at 96 to 97 percent of the) herd immunity, that’s the reason why we are targeting the entire population,” Schlosser said.
With this, Duterte-Carpio said the City gGvernment will not implement a target date of completion for the vaccination rollout to ease the pressure on the vaccination personnel and the general public.
“After November 15, wala na ta nag set og target date and let us be forgiving because less than 1 percent na lang ang ginapangita sa atong vaccine cluster,” she said. “Dili pud na dali ilang trabaho na mag encourage og mga tao na magpabakuna especially na very controversial ning Covid-19 na vaccine.”
(After November 15, we stopped setting a target date. Let us be forgiving because only less than one percent is needed to be vaccinated. It’s not an easy job to encourage people to get vaccinated, especially since the Covid-19 vaccine is very controversial.)
Only 0.76 percent is the remaining target needed to vaccinate in order to reach 70 percent of Davao City’s total population, the city mayor said.