COVID-19 vaccines may remain available at no cost to Filipinos even if the state of public health emergency is lifted, as long as the government keeps funding the two-year-old mass inoculation program, the country’s acting health chief said. | kdevillaINQ
“We will get to that point wherein we will subject [the program] to [a review] by the Health Technology Assessment to determine whether it would be cost-effective for the government,” Vergeire said.
It conducts appraisals and guidance on health interventions and technologies that would be funded by the government. On March 6, its operations were formally turned over to the Department of Science and Technology in compliance with the law.The health official also encouraged vaccine makers to apply for certificate of product registration so that the private sector and physicians could gain immediate access to COVID-19 vaccines once the public health emergency status was revoked.
The state of public health emergency has been in force in the country since March 8, 2020, when then President Rodrigo Duterte signed Proclamation No. 220.The proclamation was issued to facilitate the implementation of the relevant provisions to address the COVID-19 threat, including but not limited to “mandatory reporting, intensify government response and measures, and enforce quarantine and disease control prevention measures.
The proclamation declaring the state of calamity was renewed twice, in September 2020 and September 2021. In September 2022, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. issued Proclamation No. 57 to maintain the status but only until Dec. 31.
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