MANILA (REUTERS, BLOOMBERG) - Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte said on Wednesday (Nov 3) that local government officials will be punished for falling behind their targets for Covid-19 vaccinations as the country seeks to open up the economy.
The Philippines, which has one of Asia's worst coronavirus epidemics, has so far fully immunised a little over a third of 77 million people eligible for shots.
Mr Duterte said there was no reason why daily vaccinations could not be ramped up to at least a million from an average of 500,000 since the country has sufficient stock of vaccines.
"We saw fault lines in the overall picture of our vaccination programme. I am not contented," Mr Duterte said in a recorded address aired on Wednesday.
He said local officials "who are not performing nor using the doses given to them in a most expeditious manner" would be sanctioned and made accountable. He did not spell out the penalties.
The government has been gradually easing Covid-19 curbs, and on Wednesday, it announced it was lifting the nightly curfew imposed in the capital region from Thursday.
Mr Duterte asked the police and military to use planes and helicopters to deliver the vaccines faster to the provinces.
Millions of coronavirus vaccines remain unused in the Philippines as logistical bottlenecks and hesitancy slow inoculations, health officials said on Wednesday, highlighting another risk to the nation's economic recovery.
More than 40 million of the 108 million vaccines the nation has received are in warehouses, in transit to the archipelago's remote islands, or waiting to be used in local health offices, according to the health department.
Inoculations are hampered by "logistical bottlenecks", Health Secretary Francisco Duque said at a virtual briefing.
Health workers who administer shots were infected, while some local governments took their time with inoculations thinking it's "business as usual", Health Undersecretary Myrna Cabotaje said at a separate briefing.
Vaccine hesitancy also continues to be a roadblock, with as many as a quarter of the population doubting Covid-19 shots, she said.
The Philippines, which lags much of South-east Asia in terms of vaccine coverage, stayed at the bottom of Bloomberg's Covid Resilience Ranking last month despite decreasing infections.
Even with only a quarter of the population fully vaccinated, the government has eased movement restrictions, allowing gyms and cinemas to reopen to help boost a nascent economic recovery.
The government will push local governments to quicken rollout, and will raffle off cash prizes to encourage the public to get vaccinated, Dr Cabotaje said.
