By Josef Ramos
HIDILYN DIAZ got her first shot of the AstraZeneca anti-Covid-19 vaccine on Friday morning in Malaysia, becoming the second Tokyo Olympics-bound Filipino after boxer Eumir Felix Marcial to get inoculated 10 weeks before the Games open.
Diaz, a silver medalist in women’s weightlifting at the Rio 2016 Games, got her vaccine along with her Chinese coach Kaiwen Gao and conditioning coach Julius Naranjo at the University of Kebangsaan Malaysia Health Facility in Selangor.
“I would like to thank the Malaysian government for confirming our registration [for vaccination],” Diaz, who will be seeing action in her fourth consecutive Olympics, told BusinessMirror minutes after leaving the health facility.
Diaz thanked her Filipino friends in Malaysia, Gina Frias and Andrew Jackson, for helping her team get the vaccines.
Diaz will be competing at a heavier weight class in Tokyo at 55 kgs—she was in the 53-kg category in Rio. She got her official qualification at the Asian Weightlifting Championships in Tashkent late last month.
Asked of if she experienced any adverse effects, Diaz said: “So far I feel nothing unusual.”
The gold medalist at both the Jakarta 2018 Asian Games and 2019 Southeast Asian Games is focusing on building strength.
“I still came from a tournament last month that’s why I am not pushing myself yet so hard maybe around 70 to 80 percent,” Diaz said.
Marcial got the Pfizer vaccine in March in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Philippine Olympic Committee President Rep. Abraham “Bambol” Tolentino, meanwhile, said they are figuring out a way how to inoculate the other qualified Filipino athletes who are training abroad.
Tolentino said one option is to coordinate with the national Olympic committees where the athletes are based and the second option is to obliged the athletes to come home.
Pole vaulter EJ Obiena is in Italy, gymnast Carlos Yulo is in Japan and the other boxers—Nesthy Petecio, Irish Magno and Carlo Paalam—are in Thailand.
Moderna vaccines, courtesy of ports tycoon Enrique Razon, intended for the Philippine Olympic delegation are in transit to the country, according to Tolentino.