The Department of Health (DoH) on Tuesday announced that all expired Covid-19 vaccines will be replaced by the COVAX facility, including those procured by the private sector.
“We had an agreement with the COVAX facility that these expired vaccines will all be replaced even those that expired from the private sector and local government units,” Health officer-in-charge Secretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said in a press conference.
However, Vergeire noted that the replacement of expired Covid-19 vaccines will not be delivered immediately.
“There will be scheduled days of replacement because we are scheduling these replacements at that the time we needed it,” she said.
“Right now, we still have sufficient vaccines. The replacement will be delivered when the supplies deplete,” she added.
Last week, Senator Risa Hontiveros, one of the two-member minority bloc, filed a resolution seeking to investigate reports of unused and expired Covid-19 vaccines amounting to P5 billion to P13 billion
Between April to July, it is possible that there were between 4 to 27 million of unused and expired Covid-19 vaccine doses bound to be thrown away, which is equivalent to a whopping P5 to P13 billion, according to Hontiveros.