Flag carrier Philippine Airlines (PAL) will airlift the remaining 400,000 doses of Sinovac vaccines from Beijing on Wednesday, March 24, 2021, to complete the one million doses China has donated to the Philippines’s fight against the contagion.
PAL will send a Boeing 777 aircraft, which will be used to airlift the vaccines and expected to land at Ninoy Aquino International Airport (Naia) around 7 a.m., Wednesday, March 24, 2021.
“PAL consider this feat as a milestone because we are the first local carrier able to pick up the most needed vaccines for the people of the Republic of the Philippines,” said spokesman Cielo Villaluna.
Chinese Ambassador to the Philippines Ambassador Huang Xilian and Vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. and PAL officials are expected to welcome the Sinovac shipment at Naia.
The arrival of 400,000 more doses brings China’s total donation to the Philippines to 1 million after the 600,000 doses that was flown in on February 28.
The country’s vaccination program, which aims to inoculate between 50 million and 70 million Filipinos this year to reach herd immunity, kicked off with Sinovac doses.
The Philippine government also finalized its P700-million purchase of another million doses of the Chinese-made vaccine scheduled to arrive by April this year.
The country’s Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has also issued an emergency use authorization to buy Sputnik V vaccine manufactured by Russian medical-research institute Gamaleya National Center of Epidemiology and Microbiology.
The UK medical journal, The Lancet, said the vaccine has overall efficacy of 91.6 percent in preventing Covid-19.
The FDA said the efficacy rate is consistent among all age groups, 18 and older.
Image credits: AP