WITH Davao City being placed under Alert Level 4, the Department of Health (DOH)-Davao said the city will be among the priority areas for the allocation of the Covid-19 vaccines.
“Noon po, yung sa vaccination natin, diba (Before, our vaccination is) per eligible population, but because we can see na Davao City is isa siya sa ‘yung mga (one of the) NCR plus bubble eight na areas, kaya po marami naa-allocate for Davao City para mabigyan ng tuon or mabakunahan na (that is why Davao City has been allocated more vaccines to give prioritization in vaccinating) mostly of our eligible population,” Dr. Rachel Joy Pasion, DOH-Davao Regional Epidemiology Surveillance Unit Head, said in a virtual presser on Monday, August 9.
Pasion said there is a need to ramp up the vaccination rollout, especially in the vulnerable population, to catch up with the growing number of Delta cases.
“We shall continue to prioritize or give priority to all our lolas, lolos, (grandmothers, grandfathers) and those relatives na may mga (with) comorbidities or with underlying conditions,” she said.
DOH on Friday, August 6, 2021, released a new alert classification system to identify the severity of Covid-19 incidence in different areas in the Philippines.
DOH Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said that alert levels have been assigned to each province, highly urbanized city, and independent component city based on Covid-19 case growth, hospital utilization rates, and the presence of the Delta variant.
Davao City was placed under Alert Level 4, while Davao Occidental is under Alert Level 3. Davao del Norte, Davao de Oro, Davao del Sur and Davao Oriental, meanwhile, fall under Alert Level 2.
Areas under Alert Level 4 are those with moderate to critical risk classification and more than 70 percent healthcare utilization regardless of the presence of the highly contagious Delta variant.
To address the rise in cases and high hospital utilization rates in these areas, Vergeire said the local government units must implement granular lockdowns and active case finding, with the possible use of rapid antigen test in areas with local Delta variant cases.
The LGUs must also ensure that there are enough oxygen supplies, and severe and critical cases must be immediately and properly referred.
Vergeire said healthcare capacity issues must not only be addressed at the LGU level but in the regional and national levels as well.
According to the DOH-Davao vaccine statistics as of August 5, Davao City has the lion’s share of the Covid-19 vaccine with 458,465 for the first dose, and 437,615 for the second dose.
A total of 370,768 were already administered for the first dose, while 209,883 for the second dose. This covers priority groups A1 (health care workers, mayors, governors, and families of health care workers), A2 (senior citizens), A3 (persons with comorbidities), A4 (workers who need to go out to work) and A5 (indigent).
Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio said the city is set to open more vaccination sites to ramp up its vaccine rollout as it is also catching up with the rising number of cases due to the recent detection of the Delta variant.
Aside from vaccine allocation, Pasion reiterated the intensified case detection, genomic sequencing, testing, contact, isolation, triage and referral, treatment, and vaccination in areas under Alert Level 4.
“Hindi tayo nalalayo (We are not far off) in our PDITR [Prevent-Detect-Isolate-Treat-Reintegrate] strategies,” Pasion said.
She added that active case finding, include contact tracing of the first, second, and third-generation (F1, F2, and F3), and those manifesting influenza-like illnesses (ILI), especially those symptomatic and F1, is important to curb the spread of the high.
The health official said areas under Level 4 must secure more samples to be tested for whole-genome sequencing to the University of the Philippines-Philippine Genome Center (UP-PGC).
Aggressive community testing is also an important surveillance mechanism, she said, to curb the spread of the Covid-19 virus.
