LA TRINIDAD, Benguet– Benguet Caretaker Congressman and Anti-Crime and Terrorism through Community Involvement and Support (ACT-CIS) Party-list Rep. Eric Yap had been prodding the National Vaccine Committee and the health department to further increase the anti-Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccines being allotted to the province following the rapidly increasing demand for the vaccines from members of the priority sectors because of the high acceptance of such vaccines.
Yap, who chairs the powerful House committee on appropriations, stated that while there was vaccine hesitance among the people in the province in the past months, things have already changed with the emergence of the new variants of the deadly virus that are more infectious.
Last June 24, 2021 when the province ran out of vaccines, the neophyte lawmaker immediately called up ranking health officials to spare some vaccines to Benguet that resulted to the delivery of some 5,000 vaccines to the Benguet General Hospital (BeGH) which was used to vaccinate members of the priority sectors.
On July 2, 2021, Congressman Yap also reached out to Vaccine Czar Carlito Galvez, Jr. for the allocation of more vaccines to the province after the earlier delivered vaccines were already inoculated to the recipients and as an immediate response, the health department shipped to Benguet more than 11,000 doses of Sinovac which was subsequently distributed to the different municipalities and health facilities for the intensified roll out of the government’s mass vaccination program.
Local authorities are grateful to Congressman Yap for his timely response to their requests for him to intervene for Benguet not be left out in the ongoing roll out of the government’s mass vaccination program because of the increasing number of people from the priority sectors who want to be inoculated.
Local officials are hopeful that Benguet will be getting more vaccine allocations from the government once there will be adequate supply of vaccines so that it will be easier for the realization of the prescribed population protection and eventual herd immunity for the country to be able to allow the possible easing up of the prevailing community quarantine restrictions that have heavily impacted on the overall economic activities of the people in most parts of the global villages. By HENT
